The 2010 UK budget in brief.

Reading: Hamish McRae in The Independent, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard in The Telegraph and Jill Palmer in Tribune.

Sometimes politicians write perfect political cartoons in the form of soundbites. I think this means communication which zings from one mind to another with the least possible interference. The Lib Dems shadow chancellor Vince Cable delivered one last night at Channel 4’s Ask the Chancellors Debate when he was talking about the behaviour of some investment banks since receiving the UK taxpayer bailout. It reminded me of my drawing about over-powerful institutions facing the end-of-their-road. I’ve edited this piece to take account of Cable’s observation.

The Budget today could politely be described as a ‘holding operation’ until the general election is over. Only then will the consequences of the financial bailout of the insolvent banks and financial institutions start to unwind in the public sphere. Whoever leads the government, it will be messy.

A nod to Chancellor Alastair Darling who is likely to be standing up for the last time, his hair and eyebrows are holding up remarkably well bearing in mind the events of the past three years.

It’s a sad thing about news that you usually only get it in dribs and drabs and rarely all at once.

• The Chilcott Inquiry into the Invasion of Iraq opens

• Bank of England reveals undeclared £60Bn loan to part-nationalised financial houses HBOS and RBS

Cartoon made for Tribune.

Post updated: 11.30am George Eaton of the New Statesman has an interesting story about problems with full disclosure in news and opinion here.

The Guardian is running a live blog on the market reaction to the government’ second bank bailout here.

Updated 15.25: The FT analyses what has happened to the Royal bank of Scotland, formerly the world’s biggest bank, here. The most interesting point is the almost complete (and effective) nationalisation of the institution in the thirteen months since the collapse of Lehman Brothers.

The story of Jaycee Lee Dugard prompts thought of other long-term captives.

The recession must be over (see recent posts) because the chairman of the Financial Services Authority, the government’s designated watchdog, has dared to criticise some of the performance bonuses paid to financiers during the past decade. He even used some colourful language about the insitutions calling them ‘socially useless.’

The Mirror put some of what he suggested into tabloideese this morning – Watchdog boss wants fatcat tax, and clearly, Mr Turner’s PR team are doing a fine job. Hamish McRae in The Independent gives some context – the FSA is almost certain to be abolished if the Tories win the election – Bloomberg provide more here too.

There’s a balanced opinion piece on what was said, and meant, available from Reuters here and you can read the original interview Turner gave to Prospect magazine here (but you will need a subscription to see all of it).

If the recovery continues like this expect a lively autumn.

In between the summer’s torrential rainfall and the sightings of imminent economic recovery (mainly spotted by employees of Goldman Sachs and the government) some other things have been visible.

• The high street lending (hah!) banks continue to hoard cash from the government’s kindly not-too-many-questions-asked purchase of their dodgy financial assets. Some of the remaining independent institutions announce ‘encouraging’ profits while laying off staff. The semi-nationalised ones announce enormous losses and continue laying off staff.
• The Bank of England has found it necessary to allow another massive invention of money (£50Bn) so that someone will continue to buy the ballooning UK national government debt (gilts). This is caused, in part, by our ongoing bail out of the banks.
• And, unhappily, in the London surburb of Ealing, a Poundland has had to shut down, no doubt laying off staff too.

Young Conservatives enjoy a fancy dress event. Image from Wikipedia

The Conservative Party scored a big win in the Norwich North by-election. The party took the seat from Labour with a hefty swing of the vote, although the overall turnout was under 50% of those eligible to vote.

This week also saw the rebrand of the BBC’s Doctor Who with the appointment of a new doctor, Matt Smith. The photographic evidence, available via The Sun, reveals what looks like a tweedy 1950s style Young Conservative. So, the Beeb’s preparations for the zeitgeist are going well.

Let’s hope somebody‘s policies are as sharp as their fashions because the national economic news, from whichever side of the fence you look, is still uniformly grim.

The Walker Review into the pay of our top financiers has been published, just before the long parliamentary recess, as is traditional. The Wall Street Journal has some interesting colour about it here.