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130227 Meetup 27th Feb

Page history last edited by Peter Verity 11 years ago

 

Date  27/02/2013 Chairs  
Time  19:00 - 21:00 Minutes Peter
Location  Quaker Meeting House  Type of meeting Meet-up

Attendees

(add yourself if missing)

11 people - Dermot, Oliver, Richard B, Robert, Gerry, Gordon, Mike, Sue, Peter, Ash, Leela

 

Table of Contents

 



Campaign Update

presenter: Peter

 

1. Recent events -

  • Talk to the 'One Step' group (Feb 6th). Approx 12 people in private house, message well received. Four joined mailing list

 

  • Talk to Transition Sheffield (Feb 14th). Approx 15 people. There was some resistance ("we've got it all wrong, it's all about greed") but otherwise well received, and there was a thought provoking discussion. No new names on mailing list.

 

Comment - we need to emphasise the recent changes that have happened - deregulation, securitisation etc. What we ask for is how it used to be!

 

2. Forthcoming events -

  • People's Forum on debt (March 2nd)

Probably 2 streams needed in the "break-out" session, depending on numbers. Help needed to answer questions, though we don't expect to get into much technical details.

 

  • Talk "Fixing our Broken Economy" by Peter (March 14th, in QMH main room)

This is planned as a follow up to the People's Forum, and it is hoped our supporters will use it as an opportunity to spread the campaign to their friends and contacts.

 

  • Peace in the Park (June 8th) and Green Fair (July 13th)

After discussion it was agreed we should try to have a stall at both events, if we have enough support to man them.

It is important that people keep seeing the Positive Money name

Can we have a gimic (eg. "£1000 off your debts" handouts)? Would Ben Dyson have any ideas? Would Ben attend?  

 


 

Review of Positive Money "Draft Bill", and "Modernising Money" book

presenters: Dermot and Peter

 

Draft Bill

Dermot reviewed the "draft bill" - download here

 

This document, published in 2011, covers much of the same ground as the 2nd half of the new book. The Draft Bill still has historic interest, but the book is more readable. It is exceptional for a campaign to have produced such a detailed proposal for change.

 

The bill describes how the creation of money should be centralised, and created debt-free at the point of creation.

  • two proposed types of customer account "CTAs" (now just called transaction accounts" and "CIAs" (now called investment accounts)
  • three "reserve" accounts that each bank will hold with the Bank of England -  Customer Funds Account, Investment Pool, and Banks Operational Account.
  • full detail about the chain of command needed to ensure the MPC (Monetary Policy Committee) remains truly independent of influence from politicians, and from vested interests. The chain of command includes the MPC itself, the Treasury Select Committee, The Treasury dept, and the Government.

The result of the changes will be "banking the way most people already think it works"

 

Dermot noted that transfers between investment accounts would not be allowed [this would make them "liquid" and create an alternative to money, taking us back to where we are now, where money is a liability of the bank]

 

The bill also proposes that housing costs should be included in the measure of inflation (though this proposal has been withdrawn in the book). We didn't fully understand why it's withdrawn (Robert said he would try to find out), but we thought that this shouldn't be in the bill anyway, as deciding how to measure inflation is a political decision.

 

The Vickers report (which the govt are currently pursuing) doesn't come close in its robustness or scope.

 

Dermot's review to be posted to the wiki as a download [action: Dermot/Peter]

 

Modernising Money

Peter reviewed the new book, more details of which are on the PM website - here

Three technical points were picked out

  • liquidity ratios vs capital ratios (based on pp 58, 95-97)
  • Minsky's financial instability hypothesis (based on pp 129-131)
  • how the new system will work (based on chapter 6)

 

Peter thought that the final section - impacts of the reforms - is the weakest, and is too idealistic. For instance - it assumes that people will want to invest in green companies, and this will "create a market mechanism that will lead people to favour products produced by environmentally responsible companies on price grounds". But what if people just go for the highest interest accounts (housing, oil exploitation etc)?

 

Peter's Powerpoint slides can be downloaded here Modernising Money - review.ppt

 


 

Preparing for Ben Dyson's visit

Ben is visiting on April 15th. This will be an event for all supporters, though it will be assumed that most people there will have some background knowledge.

 

The proposed format of the evening is as follows

  • Presentation by Ben (30 minutes incl questions) - campaign update, and some guidance and challenges for our local group
  • "Question Time" format (60 minutes) - prepared questions, answers from Ben, and audience discussion. Max 10 minutes per question, so at least 6 questions
  • Sue agreed to facilitate

 

Draft questions were circulated, gathered from the Forum and from emails.

They need categorising so we can prioritise them.

Circulate the list around the mailing list [Peter], and ask for additional questions to be added. Final selection next meetup (March 25th)

 

The following additional questions were suggested

  • How do we deal with vested interests? (this is probably a category rather than a question!)
    • house owners. big money owners have more power than govt.
  • We depend on casino banking to pay our pensions, and there are vested interests in keeping it going. Will casino banking still continue? (Gordon)
  • Where are we going to get the truly 'independent' people from for the Money Creation Committee? (Richard B)

 

 


 

Agenda for next meetup

In addition to prioritising questions for Ben's visit, we will also have a discussion on developing a more focused campaign (postponed from earlier meetups)

 

Can we ask Ben - before the next meetup - what he would best value our local group doing. How can we make a difference?

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