Quintin Jardine's blog

We all hate Fred Goodwin, don’t we.  We all know he was the guy who led the Royal Bank of Scotland to disaster through what we are told was his overweening ambition, lack of business acumen, being a generally adulterous shit, et cetera. And we’re all glad that he’s suffering the ultimate indignity of being stripped of his knighthood. And having that slimy little bastard James Matthews turn up on his doorstep with his Sky News camera. Sure of course we are. But wait just a minute.

The last guy I can recall having such humiliation heaped upon him  was Sir Anthony Blunt,  Master of the Queen’s Pictures. Blunt was a traitor, the fourth man after Burgess, Maclean and Philby.

Is that where we’ve put Mr Goodwin? If so, and if it’s fair, should he be there alone? Fred didn’t apply for his K, somebody put him up for it. Why isn’t that person being publicly pilloried for such an awful error of judgement? And what about Sir Mervyn King, the Guv’nor of the Bank of England, the superspiv on whose watch Fred got away with it for a while? When will he be reduced to the ranks for his undoubted maladministration? How about never?

I know that in the current climate this is a minority view, but I happen to believe that in doing this, Cameron has commited a truly petty and shameful act.