After the banks, who’s next for a handout? That is one of the many questions bedevilling the stock market, not least because it threatens to wreck the public finances for the next decade.

It’s a mercy of sorts that Britain’s industrial base has shrivelled to a fraction of what it was in the days when the coal mines, car and steel industries and other huge factories employed millions that politicians couldn’t afford to see dumped.

And Gordon Brown will do all he can not to have teachers or nurses laid off in the next few years, because the public purse would simply be paying their dole money and unemployment would increase. Better to have them on the payroll doing nothing.

Otherwise, money and retailing are the country’s leading industries these days. As Elizabeth Colman explains on page 6, the Financial Services Authority’s searchlight is turning from the banks to their near neighbours, the insurers, due to the huge investment portfolios they hold on behalf of pensioners and policyholders.

New Year’s Eve will be a moment of truth for many of these firms, because that is when they will have to log the extent to which the value of their investments has fallen. We know the stock market is lower: what we don’t know is how much insurers hold in swaps, derivatives and other toxic junk.

The rest of the industry, mainly fund managers and advisers, consists of hundreds of small to medium-sized firms. Expect some to be quietly taken over, like the lesser building societies, where investors’ money is largely ring-fenced.

Tesco, J Sainsbury, Marks & Spencer, Boots the chemist and other high-street chains will look after themselves. If the economy really grinds to a halt, though, Brown may be taking calls from BA, housebuilders or train operators.

The Bank of England is likely to cut Bank rate this week, which will give the stock market a temporary fillip but will do nothing for interest on savings.

New statistics suggest that many holders of cash Isas (investment savings accounts) have decided to forgo the tax advantages in favour of security, whether to spend or hide under the floorboards is hard to tell.

One of the biggest problems of the 1930s, with which the current crisis is being increasingly compared, was the sheer impact of uncertainty. As people didn’t know what was going to happen next, they simply withdrew from spending, saving and investing.

While governments are doing all they can to squirt lubricants into the system, banks are clearly reluctant to lend and individuals are also afraid.

President Franklin D Roosevelt said in 1933: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” And that is today’s biggest problem too.

Sticky package

LAST week Abbey became the latest bank to join the fashion for trying to tease money out of customers through packaged current accounts, which in addition to the usual services offer a range of add-ons from travel insurance to holiday discounts and legal advice.

In most cases these accounts charge a monthly fee which is meant to be much less than the value of the total package. Abbey's Travel Reward account costs £180 a year, but claims to be worth £830 a year.

Alliance & Leicester, which like Abbey is owned by Spain’s Banco Santander, has a Premier Direct Account that charges no fee but makes customers pay in at least £500 a month.

This type of account has been around for many years because the banks see it as a way of persuading the public to weaken their insistence on free banking.

The new breed are more flexible, to meet the criticism that we are often paying for add-ons we don’t want. As well as the travel version, Abbey has one aimed at families.

Moneyfacts, the research firm, backs the Abbey idea and says “consumers shouldn’t be left feeling they are paying money for nothing”.

I couldn’t agree more. So why not let customers choose what they want included? Some credit cards do this, and with a little ingenuity I don’t see why it shouldn’t be possible for bank accounts.

Tell-tale exhaust

THE sudden snowfalls caught lots of people by surprise, in some cases to their cost. In their eagerness to warm their car before setting off for work, they turned on the engine and went back inside for a cup of coffee.

Cue villain, who jumps in car and drives off. Easy money for them, tough insurance claim for the motorist.

“To car thieves, frosty mornings are a gift,” says Simon Douglas of AA Insurance. “Organised criminals cruise suburbs looking for the tell-tale plume of steam rising from the exhaust.”

Loss by leaving keys in an unattended vehicle is specifically excluded from motor insurance policies because otherwise today’s cars are virtually thief-proof. If someone drives off in your car, your only hope is a tracking device signalling its whereabouts.

Next up: Bonfire Night, the burglars’ idea of Christmas — their most lucrative night of the year.

So many houses will be left empty on Wednesday while we go to look at firework displays that some doors and windows are bound to be left unlocked. Not yours though, eh?