James Moore: Wheatley on the right lines with Libor probe

Outlook Ms McDermott's boss will be talking tough on the Libor scandal today. Mr Wheatley has rightly established that apparently arcane rule breaches by the bonus boys in the City can all too easily filter through to the consumer's threadbare pocket.

The City's advocates like to bang on about how much tax its denizens pony up and the benefit s that accrue from that. What has become clear is that there is a price to pay for this.

Mr Wheatley is also on the right track when he promises to extend the scope of his review into Libor interest rates to other dark corners of the City where benchmark prices in various markets are reliant on the honesty of the people who participate in them.

He doesn't name them but he could have mentioned spot oil prices, gold and silver prices, even the almighty foreign exchange markets. Libor is one thing, taking on one or any of these will generate howls of anguished protest and warnings about the dire consequences of reform for London's cherished financial centre. Mr Wheatley should remain deaf to such background noise. If his predecessors had deployed their earplugs, we might not be in such a mess today.