Wednesday 5 August

Bright day, but with a lot of high and mid-level cloud about. Quite breezy, with a steady force 5 on the go. Temperatures should reach 21C / 70F today, but currently at 16C / 60F. That is our average in the summer months, by the way. The odd shower is possible, the rainfall radar shows a few specks and spots just to our north and west.

Barclays and HSBC banks announced profits of £3bn earlier this week. Lloyds TSB published a loss of £4bn today, mainly due to very bad banking by HBOS, which they took over during the winter to prevent the group collapsing. Is the banking crisis over, some are asking. Maybe. But as long as the culture of greed continues, we'll be heading from boom to bust, and that's an old phrase, going back to the 1970s. I'm unlikely to forgot the report of the young banker who jumped in front of a train, after he saw his income slashed. This would have resulted in him losing his lavish, money-is-no-object lifestyle, with several villas across Europe and continual champagne parties. Now that he was no longer able to afford all that, the potential loss of face became unbearable. Shouldn't speak ill of the dead, but that epitomised the banking crisis to me.