Despite a last minute attempt to scrap criticisms of the big banks, the Lib Dems are now committed to a powerful programme to create a diverse local lending infrastructure in the UK.
And most important of all, thanks to the Rebanking the UK debate yesterday, the Lib Dems are now clear about how this great diversification is going to be achieved.
The big banks are going to pay for and mentor a new infrastructure of local banks, which will be geared up – and with the expertise they need – to lend money to a new UK mittelstand, the UK small and medium-sized banking sector.
Redcar MP Ian Swales made an excellent speech setting out the case for diverse local banks – my only nervousness about it is that Liberals have never found economics terribly interesting. They may therefore miss the significance of this.
Just as Ed Miliband is rowing away from his commitment to local banks, the Lib Dems have set out a clearer plan and a proposed way that it can be achieved.
The traditional Liberal blindness about economics does require some overcoming, and – if they have any sense – the party will use this as the centrepiece of their economic strategy next year. It proposes a way to turbocharge local enterprise.
Yes, it depends on the big banks. But they will do it, willingly and without legislation.
They will do it and they will love it. Because it will make them heroes again. Because it will let them end, once and for all, the argument about whether they’re lending enough to small businesses.
And because they will be putting in place the means by which we can underpin local enterprise and local independence
For me, there is a parallel with the debate about ISIS. If you want to do a job properly, you can’t always rely on virtual systems or drones, operated – in this case – by algorithms from Wall Street or the City.
What we need to build a new enterprise culture, where it is needed most, is banks with boots on the ground.
* David Boyle is the author of many books and is co-director of New Weather Institute. Prosperity Parade is available on Amazon and as a downloadable pdf at http://www.newweather.org/2016/03/13/why-policy-makers-dont-see-the-next-local-economic-revolution/
