A kick in the slats for the fiscally prudent.........

Today's drop in interest rates to a paltry 1% blatantly cocks a snook at those of us who follow the prescribed principles of fiscal prudence.

To put it bluntly, anyone with savings would be as well to take it all out in cash and stash it under the mattress, or use it to insulate a thermal vest, which would be a damn sight more useful than leaving it in the bank earning zilch.

I'm from a generation who believed saving was good and credit was bad. I grew up in a solidly working class mining community, where being in debt was considered as dirty as the coal that coated my grandfather, father, uncles and male cousins when they came home from their shift at the pit every day.

As a very young child I had a Post Office savings account into which I dutifully paid every penny. Each year I would make a special pilgrimage to the village post office to have the interest calculated and carefully entered in my little cardboard passbook. It was then that I began a lifelong love affair with the mysteries of compound interest.

If I wanted something for myself I had to save for it, earning pennies by doing odd jobs, running errands......whatever I could. And I didn't get my heart's desire until I had enough cold, hard cash in my hot little hand.

Fast forward forty years. We now live in an age of over 100% mortgages, umpteem maxed out credit cards as the norm, loans for holidays, cars, kitchens and conservatories. The whole concept of saving for anything is regarded as archaic and the headlong scramble for cheap money has become a way of life for millions.

Not only that, banks have been happy to lend indiscriminately:

Borrower: "Oy you, gimme some dosh."

Toadying Banker: "Certainly sir. Just let me check..........hm, poor credit record, defaults on existing loan repayments........no problem sir. How much would you like?"

So the fiscally prudent who religiously pay off their credit card bills in full every month, owe not a penny to a living soul, and who have consistently saved for a rainy day can all go hang as their savings are now worth f**k all.

Let's reward all the poor sods who have borrowed too much, spent wildly and indiscriminately on credit, saved bugger all and are now reeling from the effects of the recession. Awww... bless.

I am sooooooo disenchanted I could spit.