Listening to Radio 4 this morning I heard one Sir Howard Davies pontificating, for a tidy fee no doubt, on the current economic situation. He informed that we could be in for another Great Depression "if governments don't get it right".
So now the moneygrubbers have cleaned up someone else will be called on to sort out the mess and backfill the mysterious "black holes". I thought the philosophy was to leave the market to find its own level. Don't tell me that that was all cobblers, that we were being conned by the sainted Milton and his Chicago Boys; that old Sir Alf Sherman was full of shit.
"Governments must intervene" is the new slogan, and the taxpayer takes on the role of White Knight.
Here's a excerpt from Sir Howard's CV on wikipedia -

His notable appointments have included Executive Chairman of the Financial Services Authority from 1997-2003. he was the first Chairman of the FSA, the single financial regulator for the UK financial sector. He constructed it from nine previously separate bodies. He was Deputy Governor of the Bank of England from 1995 to 1997, until the incoming Labour governemnt asked him to create the new regulator. Prior to this, he served for three years as Director General of the Confederation of British Industry. From 1987 to 1992 he was Controller of the Audit Commission. He was also a non-executive director of GKN between 1989-1995, and a member of the International Advisory Board of Natwest bank from 1991-95.

So the great and good Sir Howard appears to have been part of the problem before he became a consultant on solutions. It reads like he was the creator of the financial regulator that doesn't regulate. He was at the table with all the decision-makers from 1987 to 2003 as the gravy train gathered speed and hurtled towards the buffers.
Surely a peerage is in the offing.