Truth and Truman

Christof, the fictional allegory of the omnipotent programme maker in TheTruman  Show once said, “If his was more than just a vague ambition, if [Truman] was absolutely determined to discover the truth, there’s no way we could prevent him” and as I enter my sixth year of battling  with HBOS over my miss sold mortgage and its resulting £217,000 shortfall, I can not help but wonder  if  I too have unwittingly secured a  leading role in my own real life reality show. If only a little more effort and absolute determination was all it would take to unearth the truth and nothing but the whole truth about the underwriting of my HBOS mortgage.

To date, despite my best efforts, I am still without copies of  the mandatory compliance documents which should have accompanied the sale of my HBOS mortgage and all I have to show for my endeavours is yet another notch on my FOS complaints file as a result of the second complaint I have lodged, and won, against yet another biased and incompetent Financial Ombudsman adjudicator.  However, I am delighted to report that my absolute determination to confront and overturn the FOS’s unfair ruling has rewarded me with the following:

·         An investigation into the actions of the adjudicator who made the ruling in favour of HBOS without allowing me to submit further evidence

·         An apology from the FOS adjudicator for repeatedly ignoring my emails over a period of three months

·         A  retraction of the unfair FOS ruling of  November 2013

·         An extension until  31 January 2014  to allow me time to submit my additional evidence

With a traumatic year and an unwelcome house move firmly behind me it appears absolute determination in 2014 has afforded  me some more very welcome news. I am now in receipt of a very apologetic letter from HBOS stating a copy of my mortgage conveyance file  is finally on its way as well as notification from the Information Commissioner's Office advising me HBOS is to be investigated for failing to supply me with the compliance documentation  I requested under my DSAR a year ago.

Christof also said,  “I am The Creator - of a television show that gives hope and joy and inspiration to millions” and while I can hardly describe my blog posts or my life as providing hope, joy or inspiration to millions, I, like the viewers of The Truman Show can’t help but be continually wondering, “How [and when] is it going to end?”

Here’s hoping 2014 turns out to be a happy and peaceful one for us all.

Astonishments

Yorkshire born Canadian serviceman Harry Banks and reputedly “the crucified soldier” of the First World War once said, "If at first you don't succeed-try to hide your astonishment" and although the events of recent weeks have provided me countless opportunities to follow this advice, hiding my astonishment has been nothing short of impossible.

• I have been astonished to discover my now severely disabled eighty seven year old mother has been required to stay in hospital for two whole weeks as a result of the mismanaged administration of her medication and a shortage of mobility assessment appointments with the community physiotherapist.

• I have been astonished to discover my Incapacity Benefit assessment is subject to an appointment system which not only allows operators to cancel my designated time slot after I have already left home but then puts my benefit in jeopardy if I am unable to attend on a computer generated date which is allocated without consultation.                                                                    

And once again facing homelessness as a result of an unreasonable and violent landlord,

• I have been astonished to discover our neighbours not only own an additional house in which my family and I can be accommodated but, having had five years to observe us care for our current home, would (as of 1 December) like us to become their tenants in a very attractive property in a neighboring village.

However, despite feeling exceptionally relieved to find I no longer face the prospect of  being without a roof over our heads for Christmas, I remain astonished to find ,

• Eleven months have passed since I initiated my second attempt at lodging a complaint against HBOS with the Financial Ombudsman Service,

• Nine months have passed since I originally requested all records held by HBOS pertaining to my mortgage be sent to me via my Data Subject Access Request

• Fourteen weeks have passed since my FOS adjudicator declined to answer my emails for a period of almost three months,

• One month has passed since I reported said adjudicator to his line manager and

• Two weeks have passed since I placed an official complaint with the ICO as the result of HBOS’ non compliance in respect of my Data Subject Access Request.

I am further astonished and nothing short of astounded to learn that, without warning and ahead of the timescales previously agreed by the FOS themselves (and in the absence of the further evidence I have been waiting for the above mentioned nine long months for HBOS to produce) the FOS have now reviewed my mortgage miss selling case and, in the interests of "being fair" to HBOS, have ruled there is insufficient evidence to support my claim that HBOS have been guilty of miss selling my mortgage! 

Famed for his ridicule of the most banal of situations for European based Theatre of the Absurd in the late 1950's, contemporary Romanian playwright Eugene Ionesco once said is it "explanation [which] separates us from astonishment". However, still reeling from both shock and astonishment at the way in which I continue to be dealt with by both HBOS and the Financial Ombudsman Service, it is "explanation" which now separates me in unadulterated astonishment from any understanding of a regulatory culture which prefers to permit the infamous HBOS to with hold evidence and use repeated delays to obliterate my case of complaint rather than take the time to investigate!  

Pain and its Place

American road racing cyclist and seven times winner of the Tour de France Lance Armstrong once said, “Pain is temporary, it may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or even a year but eventually it will subside and something will take its place.  If I quit, however, it lasts forever” and despite a substantial helping of painfully damaging cyber bullying this week, giving up, although tempting, has never been an option.

In the last twenty four hours I have,

·        Sent three hundred and forty six emails explaining my hotmail account has not only been hacked but had my contact list hijacked as well.

·        Contacted Hotmail Abuse to report the distress I have endured at the hands of a cyber bully and supplied my tormentor’s message source code.

·        Spoken to the Headmaster at my children’s school to warn him of the potential for fallout from the offensive spam reaching both him and my children.

In addition I have,

·        Co-ordinated and ordered beverages to stock a bar for 150 people at the Friends Summer ball.

·        Compiled, commissioned and printed, 150 tickets, along with menus, bar lists and table names.

·        Encouraged, cajoled and begged inordinate numbers of parents, staff and hangers on to assist in the transforming of a speech day marquee into and tasteful venue for a summer ball.

·        Observed both  my older daughters and my mother try on every ball gown available on our high streets, dress agency rails and within the wardrobes of generous friends.

·        Altered and reworked a beautiful ball gown my thirteen year old daughter was given into something she is now happy with.

·        At no extra cost, completely redesigned and reworked a ball gown for myself which I originally paid the princely sum of £2.00 for in a sale.

I have also,

·        Written yet more letters to Lloyds Banking Group's debt collection agency explaining it is against regulatory guidelines to threaten court action and the instruction of doorstep collectors when a case is the subject of a Financial Ombudsman Service complaint.

·        Written to the previous Community President and the apartment complex administrators to point out sending abusive spam, which includes their own correspondence, to everyone on a debtors contact list is inappropriate behaviour for someone elected to hold this position

·        Scoured the Internet and picked the brains of anyone would listen for information on what constitutes cyber crime.

On top of this I have ,

·        Packed four suit cases for a ten day break which will start immediately after I've cleared the marque of all things associated with our Friends event

·        Cleaned the house and restocked the fridge for my seventeen year son who wishes to be left behind

·        Assembled mattresses and prepared bedding and for nine extra overnight guests who wish to crash at my house after the summer ball.

Although frenetic activity at this level has left me little time to read or write anything on the subject of Libor rate manipulation, Farepak victims or HBOS skulduggery, it has meant,

·        The arrangements are now finalised for the best attended fund raising summer ball the school has enjoyed in years.

·        All the women folk in my family will be resplendent in their affordable ball gowns regardless of the individuals respective personal budgets.

·        My husband, my youngest two children and I will be able to take up my father in laws generous “all expenses paid” offer of a holiday in his Spanish apartment 24 hours after the ball

And,

·        According to Hotmail, cyber bullying may actually have a consequence for those who choose to practise it.

While it is evident my One Angry Man will never appreciate I am without concern at being publically exposed as financially bereft, it is clear he is also unable to comprehend both I, and Hotmail Customer Services, wish to avoid judgemental and inappropriate comments hurting my children. However, my short lived but none the less excruciating discomfort has brought the very welcome support of friends, family and an ever increasing number of sympathetic Life After Debt readers while their encouragement has allowed me to hope that, one day, I will finally celebrate a financial future free from both the wrath of cyber bullies and the avarice of Lloyds and HBOS.

In the words of Lance Armstrong, “When you think about it, what other choice is there but hope? We have two options, medically and emotionally: give up, or Fight Like Hell”.

I know which road I plan to take.

The Powerless and Corruption

George Bernard Shaw, Irish play wright and founder of the London School of Eoconomics once said, “Power does not corrupt men; fools, however, if they get into a position of power, corrupt power" and while I am repeatedly told by the Financial Ombudsman Service unprecedented numbers of complaints are the reason I have not yet received a ruling on whether my HBOS complaint can proceed, it is clear the fault actually lies with unprecedented incidents of banking fraud and not, as bankers would have us believe, the audacity of their victims.

While all eyes are on Barclays fraudulent actions following the US and UK regulators levy of a £290 million fine for Libor rate manipulation, it has become abundantly clear CEO Bob Diamond was not wrong when he said “how people behave when they think no one is watching” has been at the heart of his banks profitability and risk management policies for many a year. With  the news that vast funds have been repeatedly and systematically skimmed by Barclays from a plethora of global financial manoeuvres spanning as much as five years, civil suits are likely to far outstrip existing compensation payouts which are already run into billions making a regulatory fine of £290 million pale into insignificance.

By way of an explanation, our regulataors tell us a wave of Libor fiddling during the 2008 financial crisis resulted from “senior management’s” concerns that Barclays would be perceived as struggling.  Add into this mix a conversation Diamond had with Paul Tucker, the Deputy Governor of the Bank of England, after which at least two Barclay’s managers believed falsely adjusting Libor rates had been agreed, one can only wonder why anyone thinks Chairman Marcus Angius’ resignation along with the sacking of fourteen Barclay’s traders has resolved anything let alone emptied the Barclays barrel of its rotten apples.

With the regulatory finger finally pointing firmly in the direction of twelve other banks for similar Libor fixing crimes it is no surprise to discover Lloyds Banking Group and HBOS are amongst those within the US regulators and FSA’s sights. However, while I doubt previously exhausted Lloyds CEO Antonio Horta Osorio anticipated “bringing out their dead” in the summer of 2011would give rise to further billions being claimed in compensation for rate fixing, it is now clear it will not just be my own case which will continue to fester on HBOS and FOS desks for weeks to come while the fall out from this latest banking fraud discovery is laid to rest.

It is said corruption is authority, plus monopoly, minus transparency and while auditors have snoozed and the UK government remain complicit in their indifference to bankers crimes I, along with millions of other victims of banking avarice are left to suffer the consequences and despite public outrage both at home and abroad, unsurprisingly No. 10 are happy to announce there is to be no retrospective action taken with regard to the banks as “we can only use the law as it is and as it stands”.  Sadly, as is the case in so many instances, the law insists the loss of my financial future is too remote for there to be any recourse.

Thirty fifth US president John F. Kennedy said, “Economic growth without social progress lets the great majority of people remain in poverty, while a privileged few reap the benefits of rising abundance” and despite the best efforts of the US and the UK regulators it is common knowledge that while nobody is above the law, power regularly makes people invisible.

It is for this reason banking crime continues pay.

Blame and Circumstance

Jean Paul Getty once said, “If you owe the bank one hundred dollars that’s your problem, if you owe them a hundred million dollars then that is their problem” and while a global economic recession gives rise to worldwide fretting over trillions, democracy remains the process by which the "powers that be" choose to allocate the blame.

For  Antonio Horta Osario, chief executive officer of  41% tax payer owned banking giant Lloyds, it is over enthusiastic claims management companies swamping his administrators for PPI compensation who are getting his goat. Lloyds are expected to pay out an estimated five hundred million pounds to clients to whom they have miss-sold PPI. Mr Horta Osario says one in four claims submitted by these companies are for individuals who are not eligible for compensation nor have they been customers of the bank and says this blanket approach to the claims process is not only slowing it down but costing Lloyds money. His has publically stated “ it is fraud and it must stop”. However he has not felt the need to make such strong statements about Lloyds Banking Group’s own HBOS executives, despite the knowledge several are now facing criminal charges for alleged financial crimes which have cost the indivual and the economy billions.

Defence secretary, Philip Hammond, has also chosen to point his accusing finger this week declaring he is of the opinion it is the individual who “over borrowed in the economic boom who must now admit to their part in the financial crisis”. He says the banks had to lend to someone and these people should “accept responsibility for the consequences of their own choices” rather than conveniently cast the blame on the banks.  However, when speaking of the period in which he helped formulate David Cameron’s economic strategy in opposition he says, “We started living a lifestyle both in private consumption and in public consumption which could we not afford [and it] ran away with us” so unsurprisingly it appears the governments take on the financial is what is sauce for the goose is not necessarily sauce for the gander.

In contrast, Mervyn King, Governor of the Bank of England, previously reluctant to lay the blame at anyone’s door, now tells us it is “the failure of a system” that is at fault and not the individual. Speaking of “a slow and steady recovery coming during the course of 2012” he admits the Bank of England must take a “share of the responsibility” for the financial crisis and “with benefit of hind sight should have shouted from the rooftops that a financial system had been built in which banks were too important to fail, that banks had grown too quickly and borrowed too much, and that so-called “ light-touch regulation hadn’t prevented any of this”.

It also seems HBOS auditors KPMG may well be shouldering some blame this week following reports an official investigation by the Financial Reporting Committee to investigate their conduct following HBOS whistle blower Paul Moore’s letter to the Treasury Select Committee sighting an inaccuracy in their forensic audit regarding his dismissal as global head of regulatory risk in 2005. Mr Moore was “let go” because he disagreed with the board’s attitude to risk and warned that HBOS’s lending strategy had become dangerously over heated. He believes KPMG’s decision to record this event as “a clash of personalities” was wholly misleading to the Lloyds takeover of 2008 and eventually cost the tax payer a further millions in government bailout support . Mr Moore blames the fact that, “money seems to be more important to KMPG’s strategy than integrity and professionalism”.

And

Stephen Hester, chief executive officer of 84% taxpayer own Royal Bank of Scotland is also casting the blame this week and its not, as one might expect on his predecessor Fred Goodwin who has already been stripped of his knighthood, is facing criminal charges for fraud and may well have past bonuses recalled to help fund PPI compensation. Instead Mr Hester’s eight gardeners on his 7 million pound, 350 acre Oxfordshire estate tell us rain has blighted attendance of the annual charitable opening of his twenty five acre gardens. It may not have crossed Mr Hester’s mind his infamous fight to keep his £963,000 bonus earlier this year despite a dip of 36% on its share price, a first quarter loss of 1.4 billion and further RBS job losses ,bringing the total to almost 50% of its pre- crisis work force, might well have had something to do with the public's disinterest in his garden.

Founder of the Firestone Tyre and Rubber Company, Harvey S Firestone once said, “A man with a surplus can control circumstance, but a man without a surplus is controlled by circumstance and often has no opportunity to exercise judgement”. However if this week is anything to go by, this rule seems seldom to apply and it is for this reason I live in hope that, despite a life now lived without surplus, I will have the opportunity to exercise my own judgement in my ongoing personal battle with HBOS and will, one day, enjoy a result as a consequence of public opinion insisting the banks ultimately accept the blame.

Capitalism and Punishment

Winston Churchill once said, “The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings: the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries” and, despite more than a fifty year interval, capitalist principals continue to force feed financial misery to the masses while our corporate and banking elite remain free to enjoy, and retain, the blessings of bailouts, rescue packages and sweet heart tax deals designed exclusively for their benefit. 
 
One might have thought embracing capitalism would provide the freedom to fail as well as the freedom to suceed but it appears the favoured few have remained remarkably unhampered by their failures and their bad decisions have instead achieved freedom from consequence via the government supported socialising of their losses.  In contrast I, not unlike the banks, but an individual with an unrecoverable deficit void of asset backing, continue to be on the receiving end of a “holier than thou” attitude towards a hand I have been dealt as a direct result of flawed banking risk management policies which saw many of the world’s largest banks run out of money in 2008.

Since then, with only the aid a few charitable hours of CAB time and the help of my trusty friend Christine, I have endeavoured to explain my impoverished circumstances to all our creditors. I have explained over and over again my husband’s vulnerable state of mind has resulted in a low paid job which leaves us nothing to offer towards the repayment of our million pound deficit and repeatedly described the enormous strain constant requests for money have had on our health, our marriage and our children’s family life. Our creditors should be in no doubt that their balances are unrecoverable, not least, because each and every letter has been supported with both financial and medical evidence.

For the past three and a half years I have borne the anxiety of our ordeals alone. I have done this in the knowledge that suicide was never far from my husband’s mind when the burden was his.  Compelled to do everything within my power to prevent my youngest three children enduring the loss of a father in an identical manner to that which their older sisters suffered more than twenty years ago I have, inch by inch, with the help of family, friends and nothing short of huge personal resolve, pieced together a modest lifestyle and a supportive family environment against all the odds.

Year in and year out I have dutifully and covertly prepared financial statements and medical reports for our creditor’s perusal far from sight of my husband’s glancing eye. With each creditors update I always enclose an appeal for a compassionate write off in the light of our unchanged circumstances. This year, however, there has been one fundamental difference to the content of this message of misery because, to my immense joy, not to mention unbridled relief, our most recent medical report states my husband is no longer contemplating taking his own life.

But,

Despite the obvious benefits of this news to me and my children, the Financial Ombudsman’s Service now tell me it is precisely because of the improvement in my husband’s health that Lloyds TSB are now unwilling to consider debt forgiveness at all. After three long years of living with the fear of an intolerable outcome, I am now told Lloyds TSB are looking for a less uplifting change in my husband’s health to be able to reconsidered my family and I for a share in the blessings that came only their way in recent years and not mine.

Unlike Lloyds TSB’s own chief executive, Antonio Horta Osorio, it appears I am destined to enjoy no respite from debt fighting stress. There will be no government bailouts for me nor will there be time off to catch up on my disturbed and troubled sleep. It appears the only hope of freedom from the misery of capitalism’s failures for me is in the unpalatable event of my husband’s demise.

American philosopher Henry David Thoreau once said, “The price of anything is the amount of life you are prepared to exchange for it”, and I was recently shocked to hear that in China a seventeen year old boy’s kidney was the going rate of exchange for an ipad and an iphone.  I am, however, nothing short of astounded to discover that in the UK, the going rate of exchange for £25,000 of unsecured Lloyds credit card debt is no less than the life of a forty six year old family man. Sadly, I cannot see any amount of tightening of the regulatory screws will ever address this.

Cabbages and Things

                                               
I, like Woodrow Wilson, the 28th President of the United States of America, have always been amongst those who believe that the greatest freedom of speech [is]the greatest safety, because if a man is a fool, the best thing to do is to encourage him to advertise the fact by speaking". Finding myself silenced by laryngitis for the last few days has provided me with an ideal opportunity to test this theory.

So far I have heard;

·        the US Justice Department has struggled to find adequate evidence to press criminal charges against senior executives of major lenders despite a multitude of mortgage documents bearing evidence of recently forged signatures and illegal alterations being made available to them. They remain convinced their hands are tied regardless of the U.S. Treasury’s confirmation that it is conducting a civil investigation into 4,500 illegal foreclosures while attorneys representing service members estimate banks have foreclosed on up to 30,000 military personnel in potential violation of the law.

·        Shane O’Riordain (Group Communications Director of the Lloyds banking group) saying on Radio 4, “It’s entirely right for companies, both our company and others, to pay bonuses when performance targets have been met” only a few hours before HBOS whistle blower Paul Moore explained, also on Radio 4, the flip side to this “reward for growth at any cost culture” was a publicly awarded cabbage for those who failed or, in his case, a lunacy label for warning of the economic risks.

·        Big banks continue to believe they are not only fair and fit for purpose, but essential for our continued welfare. They insist people should stop complaining and calling for regulatory measures to safeguard our economic future but instead, knuckle down to suffer whatever deprivation is necessary and leave them (in some cases the very same people who caused the economic crisis in the first place) to get on with fixing the economic crisis.

And on the home front:

·        Lloyds TSB’s collections department insist, in spite of the CAB’s written confirmation to the contrary, their file notes are evidence that my mature, part-time and voluntary CAB representative rang their Lloyds TSB collections department at 6.42 a.m. on the morning of 11 August 2010 to offer to make a payment arrangement on my behalf.

·        the Ombudsman’s adjudicator has explained, yet again that, in spite of originally initiating this particular ombudsman’s compliant on the basis that neither I, nor the CAB, had ever entered into a payment arrangement with Lloyds TSB, it is not her role to uphold my complaint by insisting, (as per my repeated requests) Lloyds communicate directly with me, just because they might have made a mistake about my entering apayment arrangement.

And

·        Faced with figures from Lloyds own housing growth tables for 2006-2008 which support  my case for the over-valuation of my property, I have been told my £217,000 mortgage shortfall is too “remote” to provide a causal link to support a loss for which I can sue.

It is said each of us are given a little spark of madness at birth and because of this it is important not to lose it. If my own week is anything to go by, there is absolutely no danger of this as I am clearly surrounded by either fools or madmen 

And,

In honour of International women’s day, our fair share of mad women too.

More reasons to be cheerful

Margaret Thatcher once said, “I always cheer up immensely if an attack is particularly wounding because I think, well, if they attack one personally, it means they have not a single political argument left.”  Hoping there is rationale to this argument, I put aside the financial ombudsman’s adjudicator’s judgemental and derogatory comments in an effort to relax with my children over half term. Distancing myself from the onslaught in this way has enabled me to reflect on my campaign to rebuild my family’s life and there is a lot for which I am most grateful.

In October 2008 my world fell apart when I discovered my husband had borrowed well beyond our means in a desperate bid to complete a building project before the property market went into recession. Our troubles were compounded by the news our business bank, Heritable, was in administration leaving us in an untenable position on every front.

However,

In December 2011 Heritable Bank formally released my husband and I from a shortfall obligation of £210,000 and in so doing presented me with a beautifully packaged Christmas gift of unbridled relief. I remain eternally grateful to those within Heritable Bank who chose to use empathy and compassion when considering the solution to our predicament.

In October 2008 when I realised there was also £446,000 of credit card debt and no means with which to repay it, I was distraught to be party to this insurmountable sum and imagined it would be with us forever.

However,

Today, £40,000 is all that remains as the balance has either been written off or deemed not persuable by our creditors. Those who elected debt forgiveness as a way forward for us offered it with words of good will for both our family and our future. I remain truly grateful for their pragmatic approach to our financial problems.

In October 2008 I was horrified to find our family home was the subject of a possession order and further panicked to discover without financial references it was impossible to secure a tenancy on a rented house through the normal channels. Fearing for my children’s future and desperate to remain in a familiar location amongst friends and family I tried everything I could think of but without success.

However,

In December 2008, I received a phone call from a gentleman who, having originally declined my request for accommodation, wished to reconsider our application on the basis of a character reference instead of a financial one. In January 2009 we moved into a homely farmhouse where we have remained ever since.  By finding an innovative solution to our housing needs our landlords provided us with sanctuary when others wouldn’t. For this ongoing act of kindness I am truly appreciative.

In October 2008, finding ourselves bereft of both income and assets we were not only unable to pay the school fees but were already a term behind. Believing my children would never again enjoy a private education I contacted the school to advise them of our position with the heaviest of hearts.

However,

Instead of being shown the door, not only was my eldest son awarded a full bursary but I was also given advice on how to secure two further awards for my younger children. In Feb 2012 thanks to the guidance of the Headmaster’s and their respective bursars I am proud to say my daughter has now received an academic award for an independent secondary school and my youngest son has been earmarked for a sports scholarship. I am indebted to the people who guided me through this emotive process with my children’s best interests in their hearts and a genuine understanding for our difficulties.

And,

On lodging my HBOS complaint with the Financial Ombudsman’s Services in April 2010 I mistakenly believed help would be on hand to communicate effectively with my persecutors and sheild me from further episodes of personal attack. Although FOS intervention quickly resulted in the removal of HBOS’s Merrils Ede henchmen from my case, more recent letters from my adjudicator have revealed an impatient disinterest combined with a sizeable ration of personal distaste. Attitude of this nature, from a financial regulator appointed to my case, left me feeling both despondent and completely disarmed.

However,

Following my complaint to the FOS’s Chief Executive, I was contacted by their complaints department who not only expressed remorse at the way in which I had been dealt with by their adjudicator but also revealed HBOS had been unresponsive to the FOS’s requests concerning my case and in so doing may well forgoe the opportunity to have their say. Futhermore my complaint is to be fast-tracked to avoid current case lead times of fourteen months and in addition I am also permitted to include my recent findings on the subject of HBOS’s over-valuation of my home. Being treated with respect and understanding over the pain-staking and painful process of bringing HBOS to account has not only lifted my spirits but given me the invaluable gift of a hope and for this I am immeasurably grateful.

William Arthur Ward, author, pastor and teacher believed we should all, “do more than belong, participate; do more than care, help; do more than believe, practice; do more than forgive, forget; do more than dream, work” and it is clear, from my half term reflections, with the exception of HBOS and my ombudsman's ajudicator, most people who have touched my life during these difficult years have chosen to live and work by a similar code to that endorsed by William Ward. It is to these  people I wish to extend my whole hearted thanks.

Girl Power

In the words of Groucho Marx, “The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you’ve got it made” and with this in mind I am left wondering whether David Cameron is discovering or faking the secret of life when he speaks of the benefits of corporate equality and the need for more women in the boardroom as his ready remedy for the current economic crisis.

While I whole heartedly agree honesty and fair dealing, regardless of gender, should be a motivation for us all, I struggle to understand how Cameron plans to instigate a shift in age old corporate habits to ensure women get more top industry jobs when he remains unable to implement a shift in either policy or legislation which meaningfully takes to task the perpetrators of banking fraud or makes them accountable for their crimes against the economy.

Little more than one hundred years ago women fought for sound policy and impartial justice for all.  A century later however, it is not just women who are suffering the consequences of discrimination, this time by government backed banking recklessness and unbridled favoritism, when it comes to arrears solutions and debt forgiveness for individuals.

Although I applaud the principal of a meritocracy which takes no heed of gender, the chance of success will remain limited if our government appointed regulators continue to support employers like HBOS who openly declare they have no obligation to discuss lending matters with married women if they have already discussed them with their husbands.  I cannot imagine this Lloyds TSB Group owned, taxpayer supported corporation will be one to embrace a louder female executive voice on the board or anywhere else if my own experience is anything to go by.

For me it is Kishore Mahbubani not David Cameron who explains who will be guiding our politics towards economic recovery when he says,

"The simplest way of understanding the virtues of meritocracy is to ask the question: why is Brazil a soccer superpower and an economic middle power? The answer is that when it looks for soccer talent, it searches for it in all sectors of the population, from upper classes to the slums. A boy from the slums is not discriminated against if he has soccer talent. But in the economic field, Brazil looks for talent in a far smaller base of the population, primarily the upper and middle classes."

I strongly suspect any vision for economic recovery is destined to suffer the mediocre results of the Brazilian economic field if it continues to remains so deeply entrenched in the old boy network it is unable to pay anything but lip service to accessing the untapped potential of womankind from either the upper middle class or anywhere else for that matter.  However, in the event this is not the case and more women do find their way into high places with David Cameron’s help, I can only hope their effectiveness might bode well for those of us who have been discriminated against and defrauded out of our financial futures at the hands of banks like HBOS. If not, judging by the number of comments attached to articles on this subject, Cameron’s words have made a high profile and debatable headline even if, like Groucho Marx’s suggests, the speaker has merely mastered the art of faking it.

Waste alot, Want alot

America’s Ethel Grodzin Romm once said, “What could our worst enemy do to damage this strong and beautiful country? He could do no better than to get us to squander our human and natural resources on dubious missions and then trick us into plugging our ears against the howls of those who object” and when Ken Costa openly said, "Anyone familiar with banking and finance will know that it is completely impossible to legislate out bad practise" it is difficult not to assume his condoning words are designed to encourage us to plug our ears to the public outcry at proposals to pay bonuses for failure and persuade us to discard the messy process of bringing the criminal actions of errant executive bankers to account.

Thankfully Lloyds banking groups CEO Antonio Horta Osorio and, after much media attention, RBS CEO Stephen Hester, have both seen fit to decline the proposed million pound bonuses which were heading their way from their largely tax payer owned employers. Their actions may well be the first chink of light at the end of a well established self serving banking tunnel of personal reward which not only highlights the importance of moral accountability within our corporations but clearly illustrates responsible capitalism can never be responsible if the people at the top are not. Although the banks remain an easy target when it comes to double standards, remuneration excesses and the squandering of tax payers money, I can’t help but find myself equally outraged at the news brought home by my husband regarding a recent Marks and Spencer’s initiative.

While I do not pretend to know the ins and outs of all things retail, I cannot begin to understand how M & S can, against a back drop of real hardship for many individuals caught up in the fall out of an ongoing global recession and in spite of their staff's willingness to run it for free, truly believe it is best practise to terminate the nightly waste sale of unsold food to their employees. Instead they now insist these very same people render unsold produce inedible before assigning it to land fill, or at best animal feed and compost. The impact of being unable to purchase discounted produce for their families will undoubtedly be hugely detrimental to every M & S employee but, above all else, it is immoral to squander food in this way.

With mounting evidence that irresponsible capitalism lives on in the majority of our banks as well as in retail giant Marks and Spencer’s too, it is no surprise to discover M&S executives remain deaf to protests of those of us who object. It appears English writer Walter Savage Landor (1775-1864) was correct in his belief that written words are “the only riches our posterity cannot squander” because it seems, as a race, we are collectively doing pretty well when it comes to the squandering of everything else.

Rot and Regulators

Marcus Aurelius once said, “Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth” and having opened an email from the Ombudsman’s adjudicator, I am endeavouring to focus on the wisdom of this Ancient Roman Emperor’s as I contemplate my appointed FOS representative’s thinly veiled words of contempt for my fourteen page letter asking for her help.

While the FSA are happy to spend tax payers money by the million on “shaped” investigative reports that avoid holding RBS executives to account and David Cameron continues to trade on his selective Christian principals to explain how “quick [he] has been to forgive the bankers” along with his “biblical” reasons for not seeking retribution, it seems evident the circling of waggons to protect the select few is high on the Financial Ombudsman’s Service’s agenda too. I have grown used to the obstructive attitude of the complaints business as a result of my pursuit of a full, formal and detailed investigation into the unnecessary forced sale of my home by HBOS.

Since I initially contacted the FOS for their help in April 2011 I have been told,

·       They “cannot interfere with the commercial judgement of a business” despite the fact that it clearly states on their web-based consumer fact sheet that, “In some ways we are like a court of law- and our Ombudsmen are like judges.”

·       It is not their job to look back at a situation “with the benefit of hindsight” and change the outcome in spite of their consumer fact sheet stating, where an individual has lost out because of a business’s actions, “we can tell the business what to do to put things right”.

·       They cannot see how “exactly [I] expected [HBOS] to contact me directly” with regard to the mortgage arrears that led to repossession of my home even though I have on good authority HBOS have a legally binding “duty of care” to me in this respect.

·       They cannot see “how it would have been possible for [me] to have dealt with these arrears on my own even if [HBOS] had managed to contact [me] directly” or make use of this information to avoid the repossession of my family home, despite in clearly stating in the HBOS Mortgage Conditions Booklet that letting an HBOS mortgaged property is an option albeit “with the lenders permission”. In fact the FSO’s own technical note explains, in detail, how they investigate a complaint about premature or unnecessary repossession.

·       They “cannot see there is anything to be gained by addressing each of the points within my complaint individually” even though it clearly states in their fact sheet they “don’t take sides and always take a fresh look at the situation.”

Yesterdays FSO correspondence now states,

·        “As [HBOS] initially stated that the complaint was outside of the Financial Ombudsman's jurisdiction, it is likely that this element will need to be dealt with first [and] as such it is likely to be sometime until this is finalised” and my case passed on to an Ombudsman for investigation.

Astounded by the throwing of an HBOS favouring spanner into the works and further outraged because I believed I had addressed the issue of juristiction and laid it to rest at outset, I cannot pretend to be surprised I have unearthed yet more evidence of regulatory tolerance for banker’s criminality. Furthermore I was  completely unprepared to find the Financial Ombudsman Service would, like HBOS’s own complaints department, be unashamed of their tainted allegiances and unrepentant for their acts of discrimination against me to the extent they would put it in writing.

Having compiled my reply I remain in wait, once again, in the hope my HBOS compliant will  receive the airing I believe it deserves while I marvelling at those who believe we are best served by watered down banking reform and regulation. With David Cameron descibing himself as an intermittent but practising Christian who allows himself to “ignore the biblical passages concerning the sick and the poor”  there is little wonder the way is left clear for our regulators to feel empowered to protect the favoured few.  Bureaucratic endorsement of regulatory apathy and injustice for the majority not only ignores basic human values in favour of supporting the prosperity of the self appointed elite but the self-interest of government driven directives to forgive the criminal actions of the casino bankers avoids their prosecution and leaves their swag bags bloated an untouched.

Thomas Jefferson once said,“ Is it less dishonest to do what is wrong because it is not expressly prohibited by written law?” I for one cannot imagine this is a conundrum the greedy bankers, David Cameron or his puppet regulators spend any time whatsoever deliberating over. For the favoured few the law, government guidelines and codes of conduct created for the benefit of the greater good are completely irrelevant.

Off Limits

I have heard it said that limitations live only in our minds and if we use our imaginations, the possibilities become limitless. This point was illustrated to perfection today by my ten year old son when expressing, yet again, his desire to keep chickens.  On this occasion he did not attempt to seek permission to own a chicken but merely stoked a lively discussion as to how many chickens would be required to fulfil his ambition to keep our family in eggs.  Changing tack like this has smoothly shifted the debate from if to when he can have chickens and has made me wonder if taking a leaf out of his book in my dealings with Lloyds and HBOS’s might render me greater success.

Over the last week I have;

·        Received another demand from Lloyds debt collectors

·        Received no reply from Antonio Horta Osorio to my original letter of 4 August

·        Received no reply from Antonio Horta Osorio to my ”chase up” letter of 19 August

This leaves the Irish and the Elite continuing to enjoy preferential treatment for mortgage shortfall forgiveness and me continuing to suffer in purgatory purely because I live in England and do not have a high enough profile to be heard.

I have, however, received another letter this week. The Financial Ombudsman has given me two remarkably good but unexplained piece of news.

The henchwoman at Merrels Ede Solicitors has been called off as a direct result of my compliant and HBOS have, at last, agreed “not to pursue” for the time being, namely eighteen months.  This has come as a complete surprise to me because, in their last letter, my caseworker informed me they could not proceed without seeking agreement from HBOS to investigate my complaint leaving me under the impression the Financial Ombudsman's Service was about to prove completely toothless yet again.

So where does this leave me now?

It leaves me with eighteen months of limitless possibilities.  I don’t know what they are yet but it will be a relief to be able to put my case to whomever I wish without continually having to deal with the bully boy and brow beating tactics of HBOS’s Rottweiler, Merrils Ede solicitor’s. It also leaves me some unencumbered time to consider the merits of a ten year old boy keeping chickens.