There are good reasons why cash Isa holders like me don’t want to convert to share-based investments (Cash Isas: pressure grows against rumoured move to £4,000 allowance, 1 March). We don’t trust the City or governments. After Margaret Thatcher and Nigel Lawson’s deregulation of the City in 1986, people were encouraged to become part of the “shareholder democracy”. This worked until it didn’t. In 1990, the splurge of loose cash and cheap shares duly went pop.
In the end people will decide for themselves. It’s all very well investment firms telling us that a share instrument will perform better than cash over a period – but what period? Suppose great volatility arrives out of nowhere – where economic cycles are so short that they are measured in the lifetime of a lettuce. The bankers were back taking their bonuses long ago, and are now asking the chancellor to allow them to hold less capital.
Ordinary savers are investing in cash Isas, and with the international situation so uncertain, who can blame them for going “safety first”?
David Redshaw
Saltdean, East Sussex
