Banks have now been instructed remain closed until Tuesday - a full week longer after they were supposed to reopen after Monday's bank holiday, as we predicted last week. The stock exchange is also being forced to remain closed.
There are no details of the new plan yet but it is thought to involve nationalising pension funds, getting more money from the Russians in return for a share of Cypriot oil and gas, stealing money out of bank accounts with €100k in them and creating a "bad bank". The Cypriot Orthodox Church has also offered to mortgage church-owned property to contribute to the bailout fund making it possibly the first state church to remember that Christianity is supposed to be about philanthropy and charity, not shiny things and big palaces.
What I find most interesting about this, though, is that the MOD send a military aircraft out to Cyprus with €1m in cash for military personnel based there to use while their bank accounts are frozen. Why would the MOD or any other government department hold €1m in cash that they could lay their hands on within hours and already have a plan formulated for its transport and distribution? The British government has been spinning that the €uro is safe yet clearly someone thought it was risky enough to have millions of €uro in cash lying around for just such an occasion. How much more does the British government have and how exposed are we, as a country, to cash €uro "assets" help by government departments. What contingency plans do the British government have for a €urozone member crashing out of the single currency or the collapse of the €uro in its entirety?
Let's find out shall we?
FOI request: €uro holdings and contingency plans
I would like the following information in an electronic format:
- How much €uro cash do British government departments hold?
- What contingency plans do the British government have for a €urozone member crashing out of the single currency or the collapse of the €uro in its entirety?
Stuart Parr is a 
Posts
