For the banks, we are all potential delinquents now (Three items)

I always understood delinquents were nasty antisocial types who hung around city centres giving offence to the general public in every possible way.

Often preceded by the adjective “juvenile”, they were the subject of much attention by the caring professions and the law enforcers, but they usually grew out of their bad ways, and went on to become decent members of society.

Not so in the UAE, it seems. Here, potential delinquents are you and me – expatriate workers who have maybe lost their jobs, or fallen victim to the global credit crisis in some other way, and who are aiming to run back to their home country leaving a wad of unpaid debts in their wake in the Emirates.