If you see George, tell him

The Conservative proposition that we could be offered discounted shares in state-owned banks under a "people's bonus" plan sounds jolly well inviting at first. But then you find yourself pondering why that clever fella George Osborne thinks we should pay to own shares in financial institutions when we already hold an £850bn stake as taxpayers.

In the good old days of back-door privatisation, those dashed building societies simply gave away free shares up to a fixed value to us mortgage payers & investors – provided we backed the idea of the outfit going public, of course.

In fact, seen in a certain light, asking a chap to pay between a few hundred and few thousand pounds at a discount on the market price (so that banks can repay then their debt to the exchequer) almost sounds like a stealth tax. Hmmmm.