Mutual Building Societies could set "gold standard" for future investors - Liverpool Co-operative Party

Liverpool Co-operative Party are today welcoming what they believe will be the strong re-emergence of mutual Building Societies.

Speaking after their AGM this evening, Louise Baldock, Secretary of the local Co-operative Party said

"People will remember the heady days of 1997 when Building Society members were encouraged to vote for floatation and received hundreds of pounds in shares as Building Societies demutualised. Families up and down the country took off on foreign holidays on the proceeds of the sale of Alliance and Leicester, Halifax, Woolwich and other Building Societies.

Carpet-baggers were the new threat to mutualism as they moved their funds from one Building Society to another in an effort to force votes at AGMs to float the businesses in the chase for windfalls.

Today though the good news for those who "kept the faith" and stayed with their Building Society is the announcement that 97% of those investors will be safe from threat, following the uplift to £50,000 of the Government's Financial Services Compensation Scheme.

Mutual Building Societies only lend in mortgages those funds that they hold on deposit from their savers. They have not borrowed any "dodgy" monies from USA, they have not engaged with any money-grabbing schemes and they are today confirmed as the safest place to invest savings.

We believe that mutual Building Societies will set the "gold standard" for the next generation of investors and we look forward to a new era for mutual and co-operative principles."