Banking

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Wednesday 9th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

I thought that the hon. Gentleman might ask a question like that, so I did a bit of research and discovered that one of the biggest donors to the shadow Chancellor’s party leadership campaign was a Michael Sanzone, who started off at ABN Amro, moved to RBS and ended up at Lehman Brothers before supporting his campaign. They are probably the four most catastrophic decisions of recent years.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

That gentleman was probably expecting a knighthood and a peerage, like so many of them had in the past. Have we not moved on from excessive bonuses to an emphasis on lending more money to small and medium-sized enterprises? Are we not seeing £10 billion for SMEs and £2.5 billion in total for the new growth fund?

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. For me, in these discussions the absolute key has been the additional commitment to lend to small and medium-sized businesses. Over the past couple of years, all Members have had people in our constituencies come to us with very difficult stories about the failure of banks to lend to such businesses, and we now have a commitment to increase the lending available by 15%, which is a substantial increase. Alongside that—I did not have time to go into all the detail, but it is being published this afternoon—there will be a new code of practice for the banks to treat their customers much more fairly: for example, they should engage with small businesses a full year before an overdraft comes up for renewal. For me, dealing with that crucial area of the economy—getting credit to small and medium-sized businesses—has been one of the most important parts of the new settlement.