Ian Murray
Main Page: Ian Murray (Labour - Edinburgh South)Department Debates - View all Ian Murray's debates with the Department for Education
(10 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Michael Fallon
Nobody has lost anything. Britain has gained a top-100 company in which 10% of the shares are owned by the staff themselves. Nearly three quarters of a million individual investors also have shares in Royal Mail. We achieved our objective of realising nearly £2 billion of receipts for the Exchequer, ensuring that Royal Mail has been put on a sound commercial footing.
Ian Murray (Edinburgh South) (Lab)
The Minister can spin this as much as he likes, but he shamefully lost the taxpayer £750 million from the sale of Royal Mail. At that time, the Business Secretary dismissed the loss, saying:
“We wanted to make sure that the company started its new life with a core of high-quality investors who would be there in good times and bad”.
Given that the core long-term investors that the Business Secretary championed have used the good times to sell the majority of their shares at huge profit, is it not right that the Government tell us who those priority investors are, so that the taxpayers know where their lost millions went?
Michael Fallon
Nobody has lost anything from the sale of Royal Mail. More than half the shares allocated to priority investors remain with those investors, and the share price has fluctuated wildly. I do not think the hon. Gentleman has been in touch with his broker recently; otherwise he would know that the share price closed last night at 17% down on its post-float peak.