Job lot for Giro
TURN out the merchant banks, bring on the auctioneers — now that we are at the odds and ends stage of privatisation it is time for the principle of the job lot. That is how country sales work. The way to get rid of an imperfect set of croquet hoops is to throw them in with a wasp gun and a lawnmower, so that the bidder who wants one must make an offer for all. Now then, ladies and gentlemen, lot 46 — the Giro- bank, four mixed Ordnance factories and the Settle and Carlisle Railway what am I bid? I am sorry to find Schroders desper- ately trying to raise bids off the wall for the Girobank. Of course it needs money to put into it. That is one reason why its manage- ment wants to get it out of the Post Office, so that it can disentangle its financial needs from those of the public sector. If the sellers now have to think again, I recom- mend my plan for Patel power — selling Girobank to its retailers, anything up to 18,000 sub post-offices who could offer a banking service early and late, on Satur- days and Sundays, while cross-selling other services which would range from The Spectator to a packet of bacon and onion crisps. But perhaps some consortium of gricers (generic term for railway maniacs) will buy it as part of the job lot, and find that its Bootle computer is banking's equivalent of the Ribblehead viaduct.
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