A bit like asking turkeys to vote for Christmas, parliamentarian John Mann has called on the likes of tennis player Andy Murray, equestrian star Zara Phillips and motor racing great Sir Jackie Stewart to scrap their sponsorship contracts with the Royal Bank of Scotland.

Bleeding red all over its accounts and shedding thousands of jobs, the struggling Scottish bank has been heavily criticised for doling out bonus payments to staff despite receiving billions of pounds of state aid.

So the relevation RBS has splashed out 200 million pounds on sports sponsorship - the bank also has a promotion deal with the rugby union Six Nations tournament - has come at the worst possible time.

“That level of excess clearly can’t be justified,” said Mann. “Not one ambassador, but loads, not short-term contracts, but long-term contracts, not small amounts of money, but large amounts of money.”

“I think it would go down very well with the British public if some of them were to cancel their contracts. Some of them would become real heroes if they did. I think they need to consider that this is borrowers’ money we are talking about.”

Should Murray, Phillips and Stewart scrap their contracts and should banks be sponsoring sports stars in the new frugal economic climate?

“If you think you want to advance on this, we will deal with the competition issues” — so said Gordon Brown to Lloyds Chairman Sir Victor Blank last September, sweeping away the one big problem to a merger between Lloyds and HBOS.

At the time, Brown said the government had acted quickly and decisively in removing competition concerns and prodding the merger forward, despite concerns about the risk that Lloyds was taking.

Now the full scale of HBOS’ losses — 10 billion pounds in 2008 – has become known and the share price of the merged bank has taken a dive. Fears are growing that increasing fears that the government will have to pour in more money on top of the 17 billion pounds it has already spent to acquire 43 percent stake — or even nationalise it altogether.

Opposition parties have been quick to claim that Brown pushed through the “shotgun wedding” of a healthy, prudent Lloyds with the toxic HBOS to avoid the embarrassment of having to nationalise the Edinburgh bank.

But several analysts have noted that the two banks had long been talking to each other about a merger and that all Brown did was facilitate it.

How much blame do you think rests with the government in the Lloyds affair?

In the Middle Ages the four ousted British bankers who brought the Royal Bank of Scotland and HBOS to the brink of collapse would have probably had to endure the public humiliation of sitting in the stocks. 

On Tuesday the likes of former RBS chairman Tom McKillop and  former RBS chief executive Fred Goodwin had to undergo a more civilised form of public humiliation - a grilling by Parliament’s Treasury committee.

Given the public outrage over their huges salaries and bonuses for banks that are receiving state aid the bankers’ parliamentary appearance could have not have come at a worse time.

Not surprisingly then McKillop, Goodwin as well as former HBOS chairman Dennis Stevenson and former HBOS chief executive Andy Hornby were quick to say sorry.

Equally predictable was the froth of parliamentary indignation. “You’ve destroyed a great British bank,” one parliamentarian told Fred Goodwin.

Whether the bankers’ apology before the committee will sate the British public’s sense of outrage against overpaid and failing bankers is questionable. 

But their appearance before the seat of government also raised uncomfortable questions as to the way banks have been regulated in the past and how they will be in the future.

The bankers suggested their pay should be linked to multi-year performance. Are they right? Or does the banking system need more fundamental change?

Bank executives beware. Turn your microphones off during what are likely to be stormy shareholder meetings this year.

Insults are likely to fly at many bank AGMs this year from shareholders angry at their board for losing billions, sending shares crashing, making ill-advised purchases or for their role in the global economic crisis. Bankers are unpopular after more than a year of grim news.

But an unnamed director at Santander lacked humility this week.  After heated questions from the floor about the Spanish bank's purchase of U.S. lender Sovereign and its exposure to the alleged Bernie Madoff fraud, some shareholders applauded a critical comment.

"Bastards. Listen to them clapping," the director was heard saying after his mic was left on.

It rekindled memories of Jeffrey Skilling, the disgraced head of Enron who once called a critical analyst an "asshole" in an earnings conference call. But shareholder meetings are often stormy in Spain, and there has been little backlash, whereas in Britain and elsewhere the latest comment could have prompted a bigger furore and a hunt for the culprit.

But it serves as a reminder to executives to put their hard hats on when they meet shareholders this year.

If there's one thing you don't want to be, it's the next Iceland.

Since its currency, colossally indebted banking sector and economy collapsed in spectacular fashion in October, the country has become a byword for an economy that has truly hit the rocks.

Within weeks, banking problems and currency falls meant Hungary was being hyped as a "second Iceland", at least until a joint International Monetary Fund and European Union rescue package restored some stability.

Next to win the unwanted comparison was Ukraine.  Having lost at one stage half its value, the currency has somewhat stabilised -- although most foreign investors are very hesitant to hold Ukrainian assets again.  And like Iceland itself, Ukraine is now dependent on an IMF lifeline.

Now, it is Britain in the limelight.  The New York Times as well as Britain's Observer and Daily Telegraph newspapers have all made the comparison in recent days.

For people earning and saving in sterling, it is an uncomfortable place to be and nervousness is to be found in the strangest of places.  During a recent visit to a podiatrist, a Reuters correspondent found the conversation punctuated with speculation about the possibility of an IMF bailout for Britain and angst over cutbacks in the National Health Service footcare budget.

An old Chinese proverb states that it is better to take many small steps in the right direction than make a giant leap and fall back. Judging by the number of bank lending initiatives announced over the past three months, British policymakers are taking this to heart.

On Monday, Britain announced no fewer than eight measures to kickstart lending in its credit-starved economy. Despite pouring 37 billion pounds of public money into major banks last October and pledging hundreds of billions more in guarantees, the government had to admit it needed to take more credit risk off banks' books.

Monday's package is designed to be comprehensive.  It includes -- amongst other things -- a fund to allow the Bank of England to lend directly to businesses, a framework for boosting the money supply if needed, a guarantee scheme for asset-backed securities and the offer of insurance against potentially explosive losses.

None is a silver bullet and the devil will be in the detail. Much of the nitty-gritty of how these measures will work is still not known. 

 It is also likely to be a slow process. The Bank of England's 50 billion pound asset-buying pot is one of the few measures to take effect immediately.  Analysts at BNP Paribas calculate this equates to just 2 percent of bank lending in Britain compared to a ten percentage point drop in lending in the last year.

One opposition politician, Vince Cable, likened attempts to kickstart bank lending in Britain to "giving a kiss of life to a corpse." Colourful. But a revival in bank lending is indeed by no means assured. More steps may yet be needed.

The government has unveiled a second package of measures aimed at getting the banks to start lending again and helping the economy off its knees.

The new package follows last October’s 37 billion pound bank bailout which ministers have reluctantly had to concede was not enough. It may have shored up their capital positions but it did not prompt them to start lending again. The latest plan aims to give them a hefty nudge in that direction by offering them insurance against losses and guaranteeing their debt.

“This is a global financial problem affecting us all,” Gordon Brown insists at every possible opportunity as the Tories press their austerity line and seek to blame Labour for helping to create the conditions for the credit crunch.

Do you agree? Is Brown doing the best he can in a bad position caused by factors outside the government’s control? Or should the government have been more aware of what British banks were doing? And what do you make of the latest bank package?

The government has unveiled a plan to guarantee up to 20 billion pounds of loans to help small businesses survive the credit crunch.

But there are concerns that will not be enough to get the banks lending sufficient funds to help businesses get access to cash.

The Conservatives want ministers to go further and underwrite 50 billion pounds of loans.

Some businesses are sceptical about the government’s plan. They say they have applied for these loans in the past and have found the caveats to be a deterrent.

What do you think of the plan? Are you the owner of a small business that has found the banks less than helpful? Tell us of your experiences.

Women should be considered for new board positions in banks bailed out by the government, to counter the male dominance of senior directorships at the biggest companies, the Cranfield School of Management has recommended.

It points to the fact that the number of female directors in FTSE 100 firms has barely risen over the past 10 years, with more than a fifth still run by all-male boards.

Do you think it has a point? Or is it a bad idea to set quotas and targets in this way?

Since banks and world financial markets started collapsing over a month ago, politicians, commentators and people in the street have pointed the finger of blame in a variety of directions: at bankers, regulators, hedge fund managers, mortgage lenders, short-sellers and speculators, among others.

Now, it appears, the BBC is also in the firing line.

The broadcaster’s economics correspondent, Robert Peston, has broken several major elements of the unfolding story, from which banks were on the brink of collapse to the details of how the government was going to set about bailing them out. BBC radio interviewer John Humphrys has also been at the forefront of the story, grilling government leaders, especially Chancellor Alistair Darling, about the crisis and how the country, and the rest of the world, ended up in it.

But viewers and listeners to the BBC are now complaining that the broadcaster itself is responsible for fuelling the financial meltdown, with negative stories driving share prices down, and gloomy reporting making the atmosphere ever darker and more ominous.

“If the BBC sent John Humphrys and Robert Peston on holiday for a month, the financial crisis would be over tomorrow,” one listener wrote in to complain to a BBC radio programme on Friday. 

The email was the latest in a wave of complaints the BBC has received about their reporting on the story. Until now, the broadcaster’s management has been reluctant to get involved in the debate, but on Friday a senior editor stood by the journalists’ reporting and the tone which the broadcaster has adopted. 

“Our journalism is not second-guessing what effect it is having on this or that share price,” he said.

“We have a duty to the audience.. Our reporting has focused on very important areas of public interest.

“It is in the greater public interest for us to report the facts as we have done.”

With millions of people facing an impact from the crisis and looking for someone to blame, there’s little chance the complaining will stop any time soon.

What’s your view? Do you think some of the reporting on the financial crisis, whether by the BBC or by newspapers and other media has somehow made the situation that it otherwise would be?