If you use Google Newsearch just now and type in ‘bailout’, the headline story is from Forbes: Some Bailout.

Vidya Ram for Forbes laments the £50,000,000,000 ‘bailout’ where the Bank of England exchanged it’s high-grade government bonds for low-grade/toxic mortgage securities and possibly other assorted debt in order to shore up the private UK banks which had been operating with poor/failed business models.

Forbes notes that despite the cash injection, the FTSE 100 fell 0.2%

This is the second time in six months the British tax payer has found themselves bailing out private banks. Previously taxpayer’s exposure to Northern Rock reached up to £100,000,000,000.

A British taxpayer’s individual exposure to private bank’s debt could now be £5,000 each.

You couldn’t make it up.

Northern Rock, the [almost] failed UK bank which now potentially owes the British taxpayer £55,000,000,000 (£55 billion) has reportedly payed it’s top bosses bonuses up to £100,000 each.

In a letter to senior staff, chief executive Andy Kuipers said that the “enhanced renumeration package”, which pays 173 Rock employees up to £25,000/quarter, was “essential to our continuing excellent operational performance”

Well, if Northern Rock are currently experiencing ‘excellent operational performance’, I’d hate to see them have a bad year.

Quite frankly, Northern Rock’s attitude is making a mockery of the British taxpayer who is still bailing out a company which may soon have to be nationalised as it’s viability is brought into question.

On Tuesday, there will be an extraordinary meeting of shareholders as they attempt to block the sale of Northern Rock to HM Treasury. In the mean time, the taxpayer’s exposure to Northern Rock will continue to increase.

Photo Credit: Alex Gunningham cc-by-2.0