Anything in common? Nothing. In fact the opposite.

Barclays Bank behaved so badly over the years that it compelled England’s own prime Archbishop of Canterbury to publicly predict a whole generation before the bank manages to regain the people’s trust. Only to prompt the bank’s CEO during the Yuletide shutdown to come out with a declaration that the ‘generation’ was more likely to be “five to 10 years”.

In contrast, Malta’s Bank of Valletta has been regarded as a paragon. Except, that is, for its treatment of the Property Fund victims of its very own misdemeanours. This festering wound can only be healed if the new board of directors were to listen less to lawyers and more to long-term common sense in the interest no less of its shareholders, me included.

An extraordinary resolution could be put forward for approval by the shareholders that would include: (1) an apology to the Property Fund shareholders for investing their money in dubious funds not mentioned or indicated in the issuing prospectus, (2) an apology to the investors’ main defender, Finco Trust, for cavalierly withdrawing its director’s credit card facilities, and (3) at least, paying the last instalment of €0.25 to the 75 per cent who were deprived of it on the inane excuse that they were ‘experienced’ investors who should have known better than to trust BOV to invest in fraudulent property funds.

Quite frankly, I don’t expect our bishops to come out in condemnation of BOV, like they did in the UK.

But I do expect the bank’s CEO, himself leading the management investment team at the time, to explain how long they think it would need to heal the Property Fund wound.

The government must be equally waiting for “justice to be meted out to the victims” as promised in its electoral manifesto.