IT IS surely time for the Government to change the way it deals with the banking crisis.

Having pumped billions of public money in to prop up the banking industry, to the point where the Government now controls, for example, 70 per cent of the Royal Bank of Scotland, why is the Government still handing over money and just hoping that the banks will not hoard it?

If the money does not make it way through the banks and on to businesses, where it can protect and generate employment, it is not worth giving it to the banks.

A bank that is 70 per cent owned by the public purse is nationalised in all but name.

The Government should instruct those banks we now effectively own to resume normal lending.

At the same time, they should be sorting out salaries and bonuses at the top.

It sticks in the craw of most of us ordinary people to see our money being poured into institutions that continue to pay their chairmen around a million pounds a year, plus bonuses. It cannot be performance-related pay in any meaningful sense of the words.

Money handed to banks must have strings attached and not Valentine’s cards. If the Government will not lead then they should step aside.

Coun Christian Vassie, York Central Liberal Democrat Parliamentary spokesperson, Blake Court, Wheldrake.