Royal Bank of Scotland: LIBOR

Lord Morris of Aberavon Excerpts

Wednesday 4th July 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sassoon]

My Lords, I was looking at the setting of one of the rates the other day, and there is a panel of 18 banks. I think that is typical of the number of currencies and the different time horizons, so it is of the order of 18 or so banks on each one. Of course, they are typically the complete spread of global banks. It is by no means an activity of UK banks, notwithstanding the name of the rate.

[Lord Morris of Aberavon]

My Lords—

[Lord Davies of Stamford]

My Lords, at the heart of the LIBOR scandal we now have a classic conflict of evidence—

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Morris of Aberavon]

Will the Minister confirm that the legal provisions for the offences—

[Lord Davies of Stamford]

I have already given way once. Tucker is saying one thing and Diamond is saying another, so one or other of them must be lying. On the outcome—

[The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Lord Strathclyde)]

When two noble Lords are trying to speak at the same time one really ought to give way to the other. They are both from the Labour Party so perhaps they ought to decide among themselves.

[Lord Morris of Aberavon]

Will the Minister confirm that the legal provisions for the offences of conspiracy to defraud and false accounting are sufficiently wide to cover most, if not all, of the wrongdoing in this field?

[Lord Sassoon]

The noble and learned Lord clearly points to a couple of very important offences in this area, but in the various inquiries that my right honourable friends have announced we also want to see whether there are any gaps. There is one obvious and glaring gap, which a Front-Bench spokesman from the Opposition conceded a couple of days ago, in that FiSMA is defective in the sense of not allowing direct prosecution for LIBOR fixing under the regime, and that needs to be put right.