Barcelona’s mayor wants a law to make banks obey the law.

She said “What we need are laws that make private banks comply with the law. Because now in Spain we have a banking system that breaks the law systematically and nothing happens.”

And why not have a law that makes banks obey the new law that makes them obey the law? Oops – something wrong there.

But seriously: checking up on whether banks obey the law wouldn’t be a bad idea.

I went into my high street bank recently and deposited a sum which was enough to make it necessary for me to fill in an anti-money laundering form and to have to see the manager. And that’s not a huge sum: about £5k I think.

Anyway, after being ushered into the manager’s office, he took no interest whatever in my drug money laundering activities. Instead he just tried to sell me house insurance. Pathetic.