I have no inside knowledge on the Bank of England's decision to cut the base interest rate by one and a half percent to 3%. But I can only assume the statistics and the forecasts on which they based the decision were horrific.
Before the event most commentators were predicting a cut of half a percent; a few said it might even be as high as one percent; only one academic said it should be one and a half percent, only to be ridiculed by the rest.
The implications of the huge (in banking terms) cut are that there must be a very torrid time ahead. The recession, in other words, is set to get deeper and wider and there will be lots of casualties along the way.
The NFU has rightly called for the cut to be passed on to farmers who borrow money. For the record I was being warned by a banker a couple of weeks ago that while base rates were virtually certain to come down, the rates charged by the banks would not alter much. In other words, if you have been paying one and a half percent, or two, or more above base rate when it comes down you will probably have to pay the same interest as before except that it will be at a much bigger premium above base rate than it was previously.
Banks, don't forget, have been nationalised or have had to refinance themselves with expensive money and are anxious to return to full solvency as soon as possible. As usual they will look to their customers to help them do it.
So, I wish the NFU well and very much hope that on the back of the relatively solid land assets owned by farmers they succeed in getting those rate cuts passed on. But I am not totally optimistic especially for the tenanted sector or for those who are particularly heavily borrowed.
Meanwhile, this morning in my post, I received a letter from my bank urging me to "make savings" by spending on some special offers of wine and so on that I did not want at cut prices. In another letter from the same bank in the same post I was reminded I could put five family names on my credit card. Needless to say both letters went straight in the bin. I do not intend to try to spend my way out of recession.