It's just so warming to see how the financial institutions, constantly under fire for secrecy and shady dealings, have embraced the era of openness in providing information for their customers.

The round of rises in fixed rate mortgages reported in the past week may not be the news borrowers want to hear as interest rates remain static and low, but at least it was provided so that those same borrowers would know where they stood.

Unfortunately, these reports only appeared after the newspapers had winkled the details out of reluctant banks and building societies. Not a single press release on the subject crossed the desk of finance editors starved of news in the quiet summer holiday season. The financial institutions, for their part, claim they did contact some electronic purveyors of information.

Such a claim hardly bears comparison with the deluge of carefully crafted and glowing press releases which overwhelm the desks of finance editors when the same financial institutions are announcing cuts in their rates and looking for a competitive advantage. These documents extol commitments to customer service and almost seek to garner praise for offering loans at rates that far exceed those of their peers in Europe.

It's comforting to know that in this era of glasnost, one can still treat our financial institutions with suspicion.