Lent For Real People

Britain's wealth creators are again preparing to dish out their creation to those who deserve it most. HSBC will be declaring on Monday the rewards for those belt-tightening and efficiency-saving measures which it has employed in Switzerland; and at the end of the week RBS and Lloyds will be letting the British taxpayer know the precise terms of this year's benefits bill. Lloyds will be paying dividends to its shareholders for the first time since the 2008 collapse, which financiers and politicians have so deftly converted from a crisis into a pretext; but since Lloyds was fined £226 million for chicanery last year, its bonuses this year will be cut by about one-eleventh of that amount, which seems only fair. Similarly, RBS will be giving away twenty-five per cent more in bonuses than it has paid out in fines, just to show that there are no hard feelings.