Shares for savers . . .
TAX changes, though needed, can only go part of the way towards a Budget for savings. To channel savings into com- panies, we need structural changes too. Some are simple. Any company board with any sense ought to follow EMAP, the publishers, and set up a PEP for its own shares — the quickest way to bring private shareholders back to the register and extri- cate the company from the institutional owners who would cut its throat for an extra sixpence. That should be incentive enough, but a modest tax break might concentrate minds. The blue chip com- panies should be given legal clearance to operate their own share-shops. They also need the Government's help in breaking the City cartel which in effect stops them making new issues of shares which would be meant for individual buyers. How silly, how pointless it is that the Government's own share issue, the floating waterworks, can be targeted in this way but. an ICI share issue could not be! The big institutional shareholders would now vote in concert against any board that dared plan a share issue which might dilute their holdings. I have long wanted to see Sir Gordon Borrie, Director-General of Fair Trading, let loose on this cartel. Alternatively, the Chancellor in his Budget speech should tell the institutions to move over or face legislation.
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