Bonga Bonga EUROPE

Sound Off

By Drake Stamford

I’ve decided there are very few pleasures left in life and people watching is one of them. I’m on my own in Palma in a quite nice tapas bar overlooking the harbour.

Life is sweet. I’ve enjoyed a rather nice Albariño and I’m in, as my late father used to call it, a reflective mood. I’m watching a guy flick some kind of colourful projectile in the air and suggest to all of the people in the restaurant that they really do want one of these.

It seems a hopeless quest but there is one person who takes up the offer. I assume he now moves on to some other unsuspecting restaurant clients who will become equally enthralled by this marvel of modern science and say, “Yes, yes, I must have one!”

I considered the implications of this if the Eurozone had the same ethos as this guy flicking an illuminating plastic toy in the air. Do the Eurozone commanders work on the same principle? How long do we have to attempt to hide the fact that countries such as Greece are running an economy that can’t and never should have been able to even join the euro.

Bus drivers in Athens earning €54,000 per year, retirement ages going as low as 45, income tax neither declared nor taken… Thank you Europe for supporting us. And then Italy: Bonga Bonga parties, a cabinet of 26-year-old models.

So let me think: where has it gone wrong? Can you imagine running a company, let alone a country, on this premise?

Interestingly, I read a report today that, after the United States and Germany, Italy has the largest gold reserves. They could clear their debt by selling them. So why don’t they, and get us out of the mire they’ve successfully put us in?

Gordon Brown did it when gold was at an all-time low. It’s now at an all-time high. Am I missing something?