A Tale of Three Scotsmen: Gordon Brown, Alistair Darling
and George Galloway
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HALIFAX/BANK OF SCOTLAND has been taken over by Lloyds TSB and has had billions of pounds of taxpayer's money poured in to it.
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By HARRY McGRATH
EDINBURGH - When I was in Canada last October, it was widely reported (and mentioned in this column) that a survey by the World Economic Forum found that Canada's banks were the world's most stable with Britain's banks in fortieth place and falling.
I returned to Scotland to find this news had gone unreported here though that may have been because there was already ample evidence of the survey's accuracy.
Halifax/Bank of Scotland had been taken over by Lloyds TSB and the Royal Bank of Scotland was soon to have billions of pounds of taxpayer's money poured in to it.
Two days ago the Dunfermline Building Society, Scotland's largest, demonstrated that it too had been part of this Gadarene slide and its corpse is currently being picked over by the English based Nationwide with the parts it doesn't want subject to more government bail out.
In the meantime, it has also passed unnoticed in the British press that Canadian banks are posting early profits, albeit diminished from previous years. A lesson in fiscal responsibility and sound banking regulation that Britain could draw on, or so you would think.
Remarkably, the lesson is coming in the other direction. Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Chancellor Alistair Darling, the two Scots who are in control (for lack of a better term) of the British government's coffers are hatching a plan to teach the global financial community how to regulate its banks.
This despite the fact that the Labour government in Britain embraced deregulation as enthusiastically as its Conservative predecessors who initiated it, and a growing public suspicion that what is left of the regulatory system here failed spectacularly to predict or mitigate the disaster that has befallen the various Scottish financial institutions.
In short, Canada needs advice on how to regulate its banking system from Brown and Darling as much as it needs a Scottish coach for its national hockey team.
When that advice is eventually offered, it is easy to imagine the Canadian authorities giving it the rubber ear (a Scottish term which means, in its most polite form, "an attitude of rejection").
It is proving much harder, however, for the Canadian government to give the rubber ear to George Galloway, independent Member of Parliament for Bethnal Green and Bow, a third Scot trying to insinuate himself into Canada's consciousness.
The government's decision to stop Galloway from entering Canada has been widely reported on both sides of the Atlantic. It is being portrayed as a face off between the contention that Galloway is a supporter of the Palestinian group Hamas, banned in Canada as a terrorist organization, and Galloway's own insistence that his work for Gaza is in humanitarian aid.
While people take sides on this serious issue, there are other strands to the Galloway saga that may owe something to his Scottishness.
Galloway is an expert practitioner in the ancient Scottish art of "flyting" which is generally defined as a contest of insults or invective.
He may, however, have met his match in the form of Jason Kenney, Canada's immigration minister. Even those in Scotland who believe that Kenney is denying Galloway's right to free speech by refusing him access to the country, admire the language of rejection.
Kenney is reported to have said that Galloway was an "infandous street-corner Cromwell" with Galloway retorting that this was "a rather desperate election ploy by a fag-end conservative government."
It is a long time since a Canadian politician has had people searching their dictionaries. Galloway, it seems, is "too odious to be expressed or mentioned."
Closely related to his gift for flyting, is Galloway's reluctance to stop talking once he starts, something which will not have escaped the notice of the Canadian authorities.
In 2005 he voluntarily appeared before a United States Senate committee to testify on the Iraq "oil-for-food" investigation and turned his testimony into a blistering analysis of the Iraq War while refusing all invitations to cease and desist.
Ironically, Galloway's ban from Canada means that he will be speaking to Canadian audiences by video link from the United States and, presumably, will have lots to say about Canada's role in Afghanistan.
In fact, the tale of the three Scots is replete with ironies. Canada's ban has ensured Galloway a much bigger audience than he would otherwise have had and is helping him to re-establish his reputation as a serious politician.
Despite his talent for oratory and disputation, Galloway was known for many years by the moniker "Gorgeous George" and occasionally ridiculed for his suspiciously orange all-year sun tan.
His reputation probably reached its nadir in 2006 when he appeared in the reality television show Big Brother. Now, thanks to Canada, he is back in the public eye for political reasons.
His fellow Scots, Brown and Darling, may not be in big brother house much longer either. An election has to be called on or before June 3 next year and, barring a miracle (like persuading the global community that they are the men to lead on banking regulation), they are predicted to lose it.
As the once admired Scottish financial institutions continue to unravel, Canadian banks, many with Scots on their original boards, sail on without massive injections of public money.
And the Dunfermline Building Society, based in the hometown of Andrew Carnegie who knew something about profits and surpluses, announced a loss of £26 million with its dying breath. As they say over here, "Ye couldnae make it up."
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