a more sensible target than a probation office

There was a post recently on IM about being stuck with an HBoS overdraft and facing their new, extortionate overdraft charges. I can't find it in the IM archive now but it said it was an issue better suited to MoneyBox. This BBC Radio 4 MoneyBox programme is advice to the victims of HBoS charges, saying move your benefits and only offer the bank what you can afford. What the advice fails to mention is you had better start another account before doing this. Failing that, your local JobCentre will be happy to write you a letter of invitation for a PostOffice account, which allows you to get your benefits without paying the banks a penny.

"This is a very difficult situation because most people, when they find themselves in this situation. If they are on benefits that will be paid automatically into the bank so they don't actually have control of their finances because the banks will take their charges straight away when the money comes in. So the person has less each month to pay priority bills like rent and electricity and food. Obviously you owe the money so there is no question of you saying I don't want to pay it back but you are not in a position to pay it back. I would say in the first instance consider opening up a simple new bank account whereby your benefits then you can organise, or your income can be paid into a new account. That then puts you back into control, because the bank can't take the money that they want to, their new charges, because they are not getting their money coming into them. But then obviously you need to approach the bank and you have to say that these are your outgoings, these are your prioriity bills, and whatever amounts are left over, it may only be a pound a month that you can afford, and if that is your situation then the banks will have to accept that".

The other side of the coin on this one is that the taxpayer has majority shares in these banks now. So, the country's national interest in extricably linked to the future success of these banks!

Who are the guilty parties? The previous manangement and board. They should be lined up against the wall.

Meanwhile, the Lloyds board didn't get sacked. Read this and get even more angry:

Robert Peston (from his blog - 03/11/09):
Lloyds' requirement for £21bn of additional capital is one of the great humiliations in the history of banking.

But the bank has retained, perhaps, just a scintilla of dignity, since it is raising most of this capital from the private sector, rather than from taxpayers.

Here's what may strike a few of you as odd: Lloyds is paying a staggering, unprecedented, reputation-destroying £2.5bn fee to the Treasury for being propped up by the state over the past few months; and (like the management of RBS) the executive management of Lloyds' board has only agreed to defer their bonuses for their performance during the past appalling year until 2012.

To be clear, it was the current top team at Lloyds that (unlike their opposite numbers at Royal Bank) were the architects of the bank's woes. Which is why some might say that cancelling bonuses would perhaps be more appropriate than postponing them.

Source:  http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/robertpeston/2009/11/the_treasury_hedge_fund.html

Only interested in waving guns around, shooting at people and doing a runner with the loot

The following post was written after a similar previous attack in Brighton, probably done by the same people - is this really the best way to bring down the banks, or is it just a poorly articulated expression of (justifiable) rage that is more likely to alienate the public?:  http://www.endgame.org.uk/2009/04/how-not-to-bring-down-the-banking-system/

The artile cited in the previous post talks of changing the system and that such acts destruction do not help rally public support...so what! I'm sure those involved in the action don't want to 'change' the system but DESTROY it. Public opinion, in all its pacifist glory, can fuck off! These socially imposed mentalities are reinforced by a state that fears rebellion.

Considering the article cited was discussing what the most effective way of bringing down the banking system might be, and was hosted on a site calling for dismantling and destruction of civilisation, I think it was suggesting a little more than just "changing the system" as you claimed it did... And how exactly are you planning to overthrow the system without at least some public support? Can we really expect to win with just a handful of activists? Even guerilla movements and insurrections rely upon broad public sympathy, what you're suggesting sounds like excluding everyone else except the chosen few, which seems like very insular and potentially even vanguardist thinking to me... I'm no pacifist, but that doesn't mean I have to chuck a brick at something everytime I get angry, I consider what the most effective tactic is before acting.

"anarchist comrades in prison for expropriations"

That bit of sophistry actually means "violent armed bank robbers"

 http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_politics_100011_18/01/2006_65294

Was this article posted by some sort of agent provocateur ?

Seems like this action was such a success that gimps have to queue up to slag it off!!!

Keep crying and typing !!

"Seems like this action was such a success that gimps have to queue up to slag it off!!! "

Such a success?? Are a few bricks through a window defined as a massive success now?? I can't quite see how a minuscule amount of damage to only one of millions of bank outposts across the globe can be seen as much of a success... All I was doing was asking if the tactics chosen are really going to work the most effectively (which I believe it won't when compared with other methods such as economic sabotage etc.), and I'm accused of being a troll... Seems some comrades can't cope with a discussion on tactics and differing points of view on them without assuming they're trolls or spooks or whatever. Keep throwing bricks at banks then, and see how that works out for you in bringing down the system in the long term. Personally, I'd like to see some progress towards liberation in my lifetime, but this sort of action doesn't exactly fill me with confidence...

What exactly are you trying to do 'Tactics'? You are quick to slag off the action, yet offer no better alternative apart saying that you 'consider what the most effective tactic is before acting'. Out of interest, just how long do you spend considering before you act? It sounds like you come from the All Mouth and No Trousers Brigade, or is it the We Must Wait Until The Time is Right Brigade? Any expression of rage or discontent should be supported and encouraged, if not only to let people know that these things can be done

"(which I believe it won't when compared with other methods such as economic sabotage etc.), and I'm accused of being a troll"

this is 'economic sabotage' and that is why people are calling you a troll, because you obviously don't know what you are talking about from the word 'go'.