Britain's EU commissioner gets key economic role ...
The President-elect of the EU commission has obviously decided that it would be helpful to mend some fences with Britain and has offered Lord Hill, the new British EU Commissioner, the important newly-created role of running the EU's work on Financial stability, financial services and capital markets.
Now I know and understand that among large sections of the British population the activities of a relatively small proportion of those employed in banking have given the entire sector a reputation which is rather worse than that of anthrax.
The fact remains that most people who work in banking are ordinary decent people working hard at an important job and not being paid a ridiculously overgenerous wage for it, and furthermore that the financial services sector both brings in a huge proportion of Britain's earnings of foreign exchange, and pays a lot of tax which in turn funds a big chunk of the cost of our schools and hospitals.
Lord Hill's appointment to this role greatly reduces the danger of Brussels putting anything forward which would kneecap the UK economy by sabotaging the banking sector, and for that reason I unreservedly welcome it.
It will be interesting to see if any of the bloggers who were posting with what seemed like gleeful anticipation the rumours that Juncker would give Lord Hill a job of not much more significance than making the tea will have the grace to say that they were glad to be proved wrong.
Now I know and understand that among large sections of the British population the activities of a relatively small proportion of those employed in banking have given the entire sector a reputation which is rather worse than that of anthrax.
The fact remains that most people who work in banking are ordinary decent people working hard at an important job and not being paid a ridiculously overgenerous wage for it, and furthermore that the financial services sector both brings in a huge proportion of Britain's earnings of foreign exchange, and pays a lot of tax which in turn funds a big chunk of the cost of our schools and hospitals.
Lord Hill's appointment to this role greatly reduces the danger of Brussels putting anything forward which would kneecap the UK economy by sabotaging the banking sector, and for that reason I unreservedly welcome it.
It will be interesting to see if any of the bloggers who were posting with what seemed like gleeful anticipation the rumours that Juncker would give Lord Hill a job of not much more significance than making the tea will have the grace to say that they were glad to be proved wrong.
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