Banking (Responsibility and Reform)

Jake Berry Excerpts

Tuesday 7th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jones]

I will not give way. We need to be careful that we do not vilify people whom we entrust with such positions—we should not vilify wealth creators, because they are the very people we need to get UK plc back on to its feet.

That brings me on to regulation. The tripartite system given to us by Labour clearly failed; we had banks that were thought too big to fail, with no proper checks or balances on their activity. I am pleased to say that the Financial Services Bill, which had its Second Reading yesterday unopposed, will change that situation of ring-fencing banking, so that we no longer have banks that are considered too big to fail.

That leads me on to other issues, particularly the bailing out of the banks, state ownership of banks and state guarantees for banks. They are all probably undesirable for the taxpayer and it is important that we work to try to reverse the unsustainable position that the taxpayer has been put in. We need to consider carefully how we facilitate our banking and finance industry to ensure that we can try to right the wrongs. One way of doing that is through the regulatory framework, which we are dealing with, but we can also do it through competition. We must be well aware of global competition.

I did not take part in last night’s debate on the Financial Services Bill, but spent some time listening to speech after speech from Opposition Members saying that regulation of our banking system needed to take into account the global situation that our banking industry found itself in. I totally agree, but they must therefore acknowledge in tonight’s debate that our banks must be competitive within that global market. Vilifying our banking and business sectors with an unbalanced argument and approach and putting excessive taxes on those sectors will move us away from having banks that are competitive in that global environment.

That brings me, quite neatly, to the bankers’ bonus tax, which is mentioned by the Opposition time after time. They seem very keen on that tax, which they mentioned before the Government put in place the bank levy, which raises £2.5 billion a year, rather than the £2 billion that the bankers’ bonus tax would have raised. The goalposts seem to have moved again and the Opposition seem now to be advocating that it should be an additional tax for the banks to pay.

[Jake Berry (Rossendale and Darwen) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Mr Jones]

I shall give way to my hon. Friend in a moment.

[Mr Jones]

The Opposition’s position is interesting, as we are now trying to encourage our banking sector to lend, particularly to small businesses, to put their balance sheets in good order and to keep bank branches open—we expect them to do an awful lot of things as well as pay additional taxes. We need to be careful about how we approach this matter.

[Jake Berry]

My hon. Friend makes an important and powerful argument. On the specific point of the Opposition’s proposals for the banker bonus tax, is he aware that it is a tax that keeps on giving, because—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. The intervention is far too long. The hon. Gentleman has just come in; I am not sure whether the hon. Member for Nuneaton (Mr Jones) was aware of that when he gave way. We are short on time.