£40 billion (fresh), £50 billion (bailout) and £15 billion some time ago.... can someone re-run those numbers for me and in chronological order? I'm losing count of it all... :)

Bill, London, UK

Agree with Victoria. Honest hardworking people are suffering in this crisis. The reckless managers will barely suffer. The huge debtors will never repay their debts and the gov't has made it easy for them to avoid their debts. The FSA is useless. No those who have saved into employee schemes suffer

Neil , Leeds, UK

The preference shares have no voting rights. We have no say whatsoever. We might just as well thrown the money uo in the air.
It is really a devaluation which will find its way into our cost of living.

V. Cooper, Somerset, UK

How about diluting the Chairman's salary.

john, worthing,

Why would you bail out banks that are all doomed to fail anyway? As a well informed guy I know said back in july "we are only at the tip of the iceburg". In any case, taxpayer loses. just hope we all learn from this.

Frederik, Amsterdam,

if £350 billion hasn't stopped panic in america isn't £50 billion a waste of money we can ill afford.

chris, london , london

Why would you bail out banks that are all doomed to fail anyway? As a well informed guy I know said back in july "we are only at the tip of the iceburg". In any case, taxpayer loses. just hope we all learn from this.

Frederik, Amsterdam,

It's time that the Goldman Sachs of the world are held to account

Anna Murray, London, UK

Aaron,

If we don't bail out the banks, the small businesses will be even more at risk. A single retail bank failure in the UK would cause a catastrophic impact to the economy, and those small business struggling to survive.

Beating up the banks now is biting off your nose to spite your face.

Honest bod, London,

The Banks ARE the cause and as such that's where the cure will be found not throwing money at the small businesses.

Daniel, London, England

There is a solution to end this crazy speculation in the stock market. SHUT DOWN THE MARKETS TEMPORARILY and give time for the banking sector and Government to restore confidence and stability.

peterfieldman, paris, france

Aaron, much as I dislike banks, they underpin the financial system. If they go bust, they take a sizeable chunk of the economy with them including depositors money both corporate and individual. It impacts many people. A corner store only impacts its owner and clientele walk a bit further for cigs.

Jack Bauer, London,

Time to say NO WAY! If the PM backs a bail out of banks and rich shareholders using taxes extracted from average working men and women then it's definately the end for Labour. Let the banks fail, nationalise them and save the £50 billion for our pensions.

Stewart, York,

You'll laugh about this in ten years, I remember the big crash of '87, happy days.

mike, Alford, UK

Aaron, if we don't bail out the banks a lot of small businesses will go to the wall anyway.

Andy, Torquay,

Do the small businesses not have banks themselves? Do they not pay a substantial lease, or have a mortgage? Then what about their employees? Do they not have banks either? And do they not have mortgages either?

Ben, Reading, UK

These bankers must NEVER be allowed to put the world into this position again. As the poster above says, what about the small businesses that will fail because of this? They get nothing! The world needs to change now, and banking must never be allowed to be the same again. No more big bonuses!!

A.N, London, UK

Aaron - the word you're searching for is politics, the average small business going under isn't going to cost the votes of tens of thousands of employees and hundreds of thousands of savers, whereas if a large bank fails the government can write off any slim chance remaining for the next election.

michael, london,

that's what that 12 billion euros they made available the other day is for

bob, london,

the govt should only help banks where there is an absolute guarantee that nobody will receive bonuses or incentives for this mess, too many times we are reading of massive pensions and bonuses for people who were quite obviously not the people for the job. remember the £24,000 barclays lunch ? .

cc, liverpool, uk

We should bail out the banks only to stop the economy free-falling into a huge recession. We should not bail out shareholders and especially the parasitic bank executives. Witness the Lehman Bros who are root cause of the global problem. One is walking with $430million in his pocket. Take it back.

Len, Perth, Australia

One hopes that behind the short term rhetoric that Governments and Bankers are engaged in, serious consideration is being given as to how to deal with the effects of serious medium to long-term devastation already inflicted on the pensions and healthcare of people retiring over the next decade !

Ade Bamigboye, St. Albans, Herts

We are not bailing out banks aaron - we are trying to bail out the whole country - banks are not just to blame government and ourselves are to blame! Gordon solve this problem now don't dither or you will send this country down the toilet!!!!!

Alexander Grant, Ross on Wye, UK

Ironic that after a staggeringly good run as a mutual the Hailfax privatised in 1997 and now it is necessary to buy some of it back. The shares I got then are now virtually worthless. Also my job in manufacturing was sold to Asia. Great news all round then.

bob taylor, castelnau, France

Why take the risk and leave any money in UK banks. Get your money out whilst still can. Go to Ireland where everything is 100% safe , guaranteed and to boot your get a better rate than is on offer from UK banks. Are you going to be foolish enough to take Gordon's word that your savings are safe?

Rupert, London, UK

The banks, before getting unlimited support, need to come clean and display on the Internet the "assets". As soon as the real position is displayed, we will be in a better position to judge whether their shares are really worth anything. If not, the shareholders should be given nothing.

Alfred, Portsmouth, UK

Hands up all those people who think that the people who have run the country's finances into the ground should now run all our banks.



I thought so.

Bill Peter, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Should the Scottish taxpayer not bale out RBS and HBOS rather than the English one? After all, we were told by the SNP that we were taking "their" Corporation Tax down south and keeping it for ourselves. Take the pain as well as the gain please!

Dave, Slough,

Accounting practises force banks to value their assets at the low value achieved in the market; trading banks value assets at firesale prices that liquidated banks like Lehman were forced to sell at. Any deal that curtails Executive paycuts are not taken up by Banks executives (QED).

= Nose Dive

Zen, London,

Profit making LSE share dealers and speculators making a day-by-day packet from using the US "real crisis" as an excuse to sink and swim UK assets. Do you realise you are bombarding a vital piece of infrastructure? Where is their sense of unity at this difficult time? Or is someone else interfering?

NDG, Tokyo, Japan

I can't help thinking that if the banks are effectively being taken into public ownership then perhaps they should be told to improve their customer services and review or abandon their ludicrouis service charges, as we are no longer just customers, we are the owners!

Don Bennett, Glasgow, Scotland

Everybody keeps saying that we need to instill confidence in the banking system, the problem is nobody trusts the banking system and judging by the way they keep falling not without cause.

christine marshall, Tunbridge Wells, England

If the Conservative party had known something, why pay off an overdraft? If the bank had gone bust, better terms for them!

Richard Duance, Rehweiler, United Kingdom

It's all very well saying pay the shareholders nothing but some people have worked extremely hard for these banks for 40years, not on a big salary, but perhaps saving yearly in with shares and now have retirement funds that are worthless. Why is honesty penalised

Victoria, Cardiff,

The banks are privately-owned: it's not their money they've lost so their shareholders, directors and staff should stump up the cash. Tax-payer money should only be used in exchange for at least 35% equity; otherwise there's no benefit to us in bailing out the weak. 4 banks are 2 too many.

Michael Lever, Ledbury, England

The greedy bankers should have to repay every penny of their bonuses !, this seems to be the only occupation where remuneration is inversely proportional to performance !.

nick brajkovich, warrington, uk

I gather the Conservative Party managed to pay off a massive overdraft with Royal Bank Of Scotland not long ago.
Perhaps they knew something that we didn't....?

Edward, , Lewes, UK

Last night's meeting was meant to be private yet someone has leaked this deliberately and it has caused absolute chaos. No doubt it was the Government testing the water. Brown/Darling should stop messing about and take decisive action otherwise the chancers on the markets will undermine everyone.

Mark B, Hull, UK

So they are planning on using public money to help banks who have lent against poor credit because house prices are too high? How will giving them more money help? house prices will still be too high so people will have to lend more than they can afford and we're back to where we started.

Phill, Durham,

It is time the government set up teams to scrutinise the accounts of the banks and force the banks to show the true status of their debts. It's not easy, but it must done. If we do not work to put a monetary value to the crisis faced by the banks, fear and speculation will continue to run riot.

Ahmed, London, UK

If they are willing to spend £50 billion on the banks, couldn't they just guarantee the deposits like Ireland? I mean it wouldn't actually cost anything and would restore confidence in the sector.

Andrew, London, UK

I wish Darling would get on with it instead of pussyfooting around. inject £50b now and retake control of the Bank of england and reduce interest rates 1% now... I really am getting Browned off. it seems to be wait and see what the other countries do

Andy Cappell, Midsomer norton Bath, England.

I think we need to Nationalise the banks and pay the share holders what their shares are worth...nothing! Then we can get the economy moving again by lending people and business money when they need it.

Gavrilo Prinzip, Bromley, Uk

International finance has more subtleties and more options than a game of chess yet Angela Merkel, Nicolas Sarkozy, Silvio Berlusconi and Gordon Brown seem to think they can master it by playing Snap.

Brian Christley, Abergele, UK

In times like this we have to put a positive spin on whats happening. All this negativity is causing "fear" amongst people worldwide. All that is needed is confidence to be restored in the markets worldwide and as soon as this happens we can all get on with out lives and move forward.

Erica, Oxford,

If the banks need more capital, why not ask shareholders first and then let the govt take whatever shareholders do not stump up?

This ensures the govt is only putting in the money it has to and allows those shareholders that wish to maintain their holdings.

Brian Golden, Dublin, Ireland

What are the chances of a run on RBS \ Natwest? Unthinkable in the hey days, when RBS took over Natwest, but now?

W Smith, Manchester,

you never see a thin banker or a thin bookmaker . there greed put them in this position , give them nothing unless the government give the same help to every one .

graham gough, Klaipeda, lithuania

Aaron - because the banks underpin & finance everyday business. If banks were to recall all their loans because they need to offset their poor investments, thousands of businesses would fold overnight - it is a fundamental flaw of the credit-based capitalist market.

Carlos, Basel, CH

The role of banks is to provide financing to businesses and individuals. The quicker banks are put back on a healthy footing the quicker this can feed down to their dependents in the wider economy. The Chancellor and BOE need to act quickly and with full force to sow the seeds of economic repair.

Nick, London,

Why do we have to bail out only the banks that are the cause of this chaos we are in? what about the small businesses who are struggling and it is not their fault.

Aaron, london, uk