madam president we propose very seriously to exacerbate it
the cause of the financial crisis was excessive state intervention first in the sense that interest rates were deliberately kept too low for too long a political rather than a market decision one in which all the central banks were complicit and then in the sense that as recently as last year legislatures were urging lenders to make more cheap loans available
so the g twenty leaders get together and they say what is the solution
more state intervention
i suppose as mark twain once observed that if all that you have is a hammer everything starts to look like a nail
but the truth is that every action they have taken has at best been useless and at worst has actively deteriorated our situation the bail-outs the nationalisations the pretence of going after tax havens by which they in fact mean countries with more competitive tax rates than theirs and the massive extension of state jurisdiction under the pretext of contingency
and now we want to reform the entire financial system
i will close with the words of my late countryman mr justice asprey reform
aren t things bad enough already
