Afternoon:
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The anti-capitalist protesters camped outside St Paul's have the appeal of novelty - although if they are still there in the New Year, we can expect them to attract a more dusty response. But for now, the Occupy London group, despite its inchoate aims, has attracted remarkable goodwill.
As we report today, even some passing City workers have expressed support for a protest aimed at the financial sector. That fact should give us pause.
Very many ordinary people who would never dream of pitching tents in EC4, including some City workers, feel resentment at the way the economy was held to ransom by the financial sector. The protesters are tapping into indignation about the way the system works: when financiers are successful, they keep the money, but when they make vast mistakes, the rest of us bail them out. Many ordinary people feel, too, that corporate bonuses often bear no real relation to hard work and expertise.
The protests echo those in Italy, Greece and New York. There, too, people are conscious that the bad investment decisions by international banks helped precipitate an economic crisis that has taken a heavy toll in jobs.
For all that, the protesters' view of the financial sector and corporate life is one-dimensional. So far as the UK is concerned, the City of London generates enormous sums for the Treasury, something like £30 billion a year.
London and the City contribute disproportionately to the national tax take. We cannot do without its contribution. And if high-earners are driven from the UK, we all suffer.
Nevertheless, there is broad support for reform of the system. Some modest improvement is under way: the Vickers reforms of banks should eventually ensure that their retail functions will be ringfenced in future. Changes to the bonus system are also taking place, so as to reward long-term performance. Fund-managers are more critical of unjustified bonuses paid by firms in which they invest.
Occupy London may not stand up to rational analysis but it does tap into a public mood. And that is something politicians as well as financiers need to take on board.
MPs still out of touch
When it comes to groups that suffer from poor public perception, MPs are probably on a par with bankers. Yet at a time when most people in work are glad to be in a job, often taking pay cuts and part-time work in preference to redundancy, we now learn that MPs have awarded themselves another week's holiday on top of their already generous leave. They will now get an extra five-day mini-break in November; their three-week Christmas break will follow a month after their return.
MPs assure us that their vacations are purely nominal and that they work as hard in their constituencies as they do in Westminster. Possibly some do. But what is so galling about this move - and there is a remarkable degree of cross-party consensus when it comes to MPs' perks - is that it suggests that our political classes are still completely out of touch with the rest of us. The expenses scandal, it would appear, hasn't taught them much.
Games lesson
One of the promises of the London 2012 Olympics was that they would involve all parts of the community, and, duly, schools have been allocated 125,000 tickets for the Olympic and Paralympic Games. Yet, remarkably, nearly half of London schools have failed to claim their allocation. Their children would love to go. Headteachers who have not yet applied should go to the back of the class.
