Bank of England and Financial Services Bill [Lords]

Ronnie Campbell Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 19th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[Richard Burgon]

It is my pleasure to speak for the Opposition on Third Reading of the Bank of England and Financial Services Bill. The Chair of the Treasury Committee very kindly referred to the good humour and good nature I showed in one of my speeches. I am afraid that, if he were here now, he would be disappointed with the speech that I am about to make. People could be forgiven for thinking that I am returning to what some call my po-faced modus operandi.

The role of Government in legislating for financial stability and in ensuring that the Bank of England acts in the interests of the wider economy is to get the balance of regulation right. Righting the wrongs of the 2008 bankers’ crisis is an important task for any responsible Government—a task that Governments around the world have focused on fulfilling in the past decade. The task has been being attempted since the bankers’ crisis of 2008, and today the bankers’ Chancellor is threatening to set it back.

The Bill has seen a number of changes since it first appeared in the other place, some of them for the better, but the precipitate changes that the Government are making to financial services regulation through their new settlement with the financial sector, including through measures in this Bill, suggest that they have failed to learn the lessons of the 2008 bankers’ crisis.

The Bill is a missed opportunity. The measures we have challenged on Second Reading, in Committee and on Report include the proposed abolition of the Bank’s oversight committee, the proposed veto on the National Audit Office’s powers of investigation, the proposed downgrading of the power of the Prudential Regulation Authority to that of a committee of the Bank, and the proposed reversal of the presumption of senior managers’ responsibility for misconduct cases. However, we also welcome a number of measures, including the Lords-stage concessions on the powers of oversight for the Bank’s non-executive directors, the reversal of the veto on the NAO’s powers of investigation, and the measures announced on funding for illegal money-lending teams in Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs.

We are disappointed that other proposals have not been accepted by the Government. The leak of the Panama papers in the past fortnight has reawakened public concern about our financial system. There has been publication of thousands of documents detailing the systematic use of tax havens for the registration of secretive trusts and shell companies that are serviced by UK banks and that hold trillions of pounds out of reach of HMRC—a state of affairs that rightly outrages people across the UK and the globe. That is why earlier today we offered the Government an opportunity to demonstrate their commitment to delivering the necessary tax transparency measures through our new clause 14.

That new clause, if the Government had supported it, would have instituted a new principle for the FCA: that of combating abusive tax avoidance arrangements, including by establishing a register of beneficial owners of trusts serviced by UK banks. Of course, that in itself is not sufficient, and Labour has set out its tax transparency enforcement plan. Earlier today, our new clause raised the vital issue of the UK banks’ involvement in the Panama papers, which the FCA has now asked them to report on.

The Government have set out initial plans but, with respect, they have not in our view grasped the bull by the horns. They have been dragged there by campaigners, charities and commentators who have rightly urged action on anti-abuse rules and country-by-country reporting. However, it is on the regulation of banks’ activity here in the UK, which has been such a dominant issue in recent years, that the Government have rolled back, watering down their proposals—or, should I say, U-turning on them.

Under the current presumption of responsibility that applies to senior managers, to avoid being found guilty of misconduct in an area for which they are responsible, they will have to show that they took reasonable steps to prevent that contravention. The Bill removes that onus on top bankers, an onus that is entirely reasonable, entirely proportionate and, as very bitter experience tells the British people, entirely necessary. Misconduct and misdemeanours in financial services are sadly not merely a tale from our history. In 2015, for example, the FCA had to fine firms more than £900 million. There was also the LIBOR scandal, foreign exchange fines and the mis-selling of PPI to the value of up to £33 billion, and the presumption of responsibility was so reasonable and so necessary that the policy was introduced with cross-party support. That should not be forgotten.

It is remarkable that only days after the leak of the Panama papers and the pressure on the Prime Minister to defend his creative financial arrangements, the Government can come to this House and defend their decision to reverse regulation that they chose to bring in back in 2013, following the comprehensive work of the Chair of the Treasury Committee, my colleague Lord McFall, and others on the Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards. This measure, which the Government are yet to implement, has been rolled back by the bankers’ Chancellor under pressure from those who would have been scrutinised. This change of policy did not take place in isolation; as I say, it was part of the Chancellor’s new settlement with the financial sector.

Another idea that we supported today, alongside our Treasury Committee colleagues, was strengthening the role of the Treasury Committee in the appointment of the chief executive of the FCA. It is the Treasury’s influence over the FCA and financial regulation that has been the subject of so much debate and concern in the past year; there has been debate and concern about the removal of Martin Wheatley and the scrapping of the FCA review of banking culture. More widely, as part of the post-crash debate, there have been concerns about whether bank capitalisation and leverage would be at sufficient levels and whether a suitably strong ring-fence would be implemented.

Added to this toxic cocktail of the bankers’ Chancellor’s own stirring is his unhealthy obsession with flogging off the Government’s Royal Bank of Scotland shares at a huge cost to the public purse. I have previously asked the Minister whether the Government will establish a floor price for the sale of RBS shares, as they have with Lloyds shares—or do they accept that the Chancellor got it wrong when he said that his loss leader last year would lead to better sales?

There is also the issue of pension master trusts. In Committee, the Minister told my colleague the shadow Financial Secretary that the Government would bring forward legislation, but the Minister of State for Pensions has since told the Work and Pensions Committee:

“I have been pressing for a Pensions Bill but so far we don’t have one”,

even though the Government could not protect savers without one. Will the Minister say when the Government will take action?

This Bill is a missed opportunity to demonstrate how the Bank of England could carry out its work in the most efficient way possible, with transparency and accountability in its decision making, serving the interests of the people who have sent us here to represent them, and a missed opportunity to demonstrate that senior managers in the financial sector could continue to do their jobs while being effectively and appropriately regulated. These are more missed opportunities from the missed-target Chancellor.

The context of the Bill is vital to understanding our concerns, and the concerns and demands of the wider public. We are eight years on from the economic crisis—the bankers’ crisis, which brought the financial services sector and our country to their knees. The sector was rescued by the decisive action of the then Prime Minister.

[Mr Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that we should take over and run these dodgy banks that have been in trouble all these years?

[Richard Burgon]

The Prime Minister of the day did step in and take appropriate action. The important thing is that the lessons of the financial crisis and the banking crisis are learned. I believe that the Opposition have learned those lessons, but those on the Government Benches have not.

Do the Chancellor and the Government still not understand the widespread anger out there? Do they not recognise the public’s deep distaste for the ever-expanding horror story of bailed-out bankers not being brought to book? The Panama papers shone a light on the squalid practice of the super-rich squirreling away money offshore that Britain needs for our schools and hospitals, and to bring down the UK debt that has rocketed on the Chancellor’s watch. As I said on Second Reading, all that is taking place while there are cuts to pay, pensions, welfare, councils and services.

The public are right to remember that because of the behaviour of some top bankers, people whom this House is meant to represent lost their homes and their jobs. We should never forget that it was the bankers’ crisis that caused the deficit that this Government have relied on as their justification for their political choice to cut our public services, cut funding to our local authorities, cut the incomes of working people and cut support for the most vulnerable people in our communities. The global financial crash caused the huge increase in the deficit and stalled the economy. It also gave the Government the opportunity to carry out their long-harboured and decades-old ideological desire to cut public services and wither away the state.

We need a healthy and effective banking sector, but one that is appropriately regulated, serves the interests of the whole economy, does not hurt ordinary people or small and medium-sized businesses and delivers the vital investment our country needs for long-term growth. The Conservative Government’s climbdown on the presumption of responsibility, which they previously supported, will hinder, not help, the fulfilment of those ambitions.

Personal responsibility is vital for the operation of our regulatory systems. The Chancellor’s policy U-turn reduces precisely the personal responsibility that the Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards recommended in its 500-page report. Scrapping a key measures before it has even had a chance to be tested makes no sense—unless, of course, the Chancellor is just following bankers’ orders. The startling and precipitous scrapping of a widely welcomed measure shows that there is a very real risk of failing to learn the lessons of the bankers’ crisis, and that is why we will oppose the Bill today. I urge all hon. Members to do the same.

Spending Review and Autumn Statement

Ronnie Campbell Excerpts

Wednesday 25th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I am sure that the decisions taken on the NHS, education and policing will be very welcome in his constituency. They will enable us to deliver on the promises he made to local people. It is very easy for people to get up and say, “We want more money spent on this and more money spent on that,” but I do not think I have yet heard an answer to my challenge to the Labour party to come up with a single public expenditure saving.

[Mr Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) (Lab)]

Trident.

[Mr Osborne]

There you go—Trident. That is the modern Labour party: it wants to get rid of our nuclear deterrent. Some Labour Members are now shaking their heads. May I make a polite suggestion? Why does not the Labour party sort out its policies and then come to the House of Commons and tell us what they are?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Osborne]

The current funding for schools is arbitrary and unfair. Children in different areas but with exactly the same circumstances can receive many thousands of pounds in funding at their schools, depending on where in the country they live. Cambridgeshire is one of the areas that has been underfunded historically. The new national funding formula will help address that unfairness. My hon. Friend has been championing that cause, and my right hon. Friend the Education Secretary will set out how the formula is going to work.

[Mr Ronnie Campbell]

Has the Chancellor got any plans to bring in more privatisation to the health service?

[Mr Osborne]

Our national health service is publicly run, free at the point of use and now well funded under this Conservative Government.

Autumn Statement

Ronnie Campbell Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend is right that the new catapults that we have set out—the formulation centre and the investment in the high-value manufacturing catapult—will help the north of England, particularly around the area that he represents. Support for the chemical industry is important. The changes to energy taxation in the Budget will help the chemical industry. There might be an opportunity to look at specific things that we could do to help the chemical industry further, rather than all energy-intensive industries. I am happy to have that discussion with him and other Members who represent constituencies with chemical manufacturers.

[Mr Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) (Lab)]

If the Chancellor is right that the UK is the leading world economy, why does he not give health service workers their 1% increase?

[Mr Osborne]

Of course, our pay settlement does give health service workers 1%. For those on progression pay, we are saying that there should be a 1% pay rise in total. We are able to afford a strong national health service, to put the money into the national health service that we have announced over the past few days and to support the NHS’s forward plan about its bright future only because we have a strong economy. In the north-east of England, as the hon. Gentleman knows, we are investing in jobs and roads. I would have hoped that he would welcome the news this week on the A1 Gateshead bypass and the A1 north to Ellingham.

Money Creation and Society

Ronnie Campbell Excerpts

Thursday 20th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Steve Baker]

I think I hear the echoes of a particularly fashionable economist there. If the hon. Lady is saying that she would like rising real wage levels, of course I agree with her. Who wouldn’t? I want rising real wage levels, but something about which I get incredibly frustrated is the use of that word “capital”. I have heard economists talk about capital when what they really mean is money, and typically what they mean by money is new bank credit, because 97% of the money supply is bank credit. That is not capital; capital is the means of production. There is a lengthy conversation to be had on this subject, but if the hon. Lady will forgive me, I do not want to go into that today. I fear that we have started to label as capital money that has been loaned into existence without any real backing. That might explain why our capital stock has been undermined as we have de-industrialised, and why real wages have dropped. In the end, real wages can rise only if productivity increases, and that means an increase in the real stock of capital.

To return to where I wanted to go: where did all the money that was created as debt go? The sectoral lending figures show that while some of it went into commercial property, and some into personal loans, credit cards and so on, the rise of lending into real productive businesses excluding the financial sector was relatively moderate. Overwhelmingly, the new debt went into mortgages and the financial sector. Exchange and the distribution of wealth are part of the same social process. If I buy an apple, the distribution of apples and money will change. Money is used to buy houses, and we should not be at all surprised that an increased supply of money into house-buying will boost the price of those homes.

[Mr Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) (Lab)]

This is a great debate, but let us talk about ordinary people and their labour, because that involves money as well. To those people, talking about how capitalism works is like talking about something at the end of the universe. They simply need money to survive, and anything else might as well be at the end of the universe.

[Steve Baker]

The hon. Gentleman is quite right, and I welcome the spirit in which he asks that question. The vast majority of us, on both sides of the House, live on our labour. We work in order to obtain money so that we can obtain the things we need to survive.

The hon. Gentleman pre-empts another remark that I was going to make, which is that there is a categorical difference between earning money through the sweat of one’s brow and making money by just creating it when lending it to someone in exchange for a claim on the deeds to their house. Those two concepts are fundamentally, categorically different, and this goes to the heart of how capitalism works. I appreciate that very little of this would find its way on to an election leaflet, but it matters a great deal nevertheless. Perhaps I shall need to ask my opponent if he has followed this debate.

My point is that if a great fountain of new money gushes up into the financial sector, we should not be surprised to find that the banking system is far wealthier than anyone else. We should not be surprised if financing and housing in London and the south-east are far wealthier than anywhere else. Indeed, I remember that when quantitative easing began, house prices started rising in Chiswick and Islington. Money is not neutral. It redistributes real income from later to earlier owners—that is, from the poor to the rich, on the whole. That distribution effect is key to understanding the effect of new money on society. It is the primary cause of almost all conflicts revolving around the production of money and around the relations between creditors and debtors.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Meacher]

I am neither for nor against. I am making the point that the arrangement encourages the banks to increase their risk taking. If they are caught out, for each depositor £85,000 is guaranteed by the state. I agree with the hon. Member for Wycombe that we need much wider structural change. It is not a question of tweaking one thing here or there.

The question at the heart of the debate is who should create the money? Would Parliament ever have voted to delegate power to create money to those same banks that caused the horrendous financial crisis that the world is still suffering? I think the answer is unambiguously no. The question that needs to be put is how we should achieve the switch from unbridled consumerism to a framework of productive investment capable of generating a successful and sustainable manufacturing and industrial base that can securely underpin UK living standards.

Two models have hitherto been used to operate such a system. One was the centralised direction of finance, which was used extremely successfully by several Asian countries, especially the south-east Asian so-called tiger economies, after the second world war, to achieve take-off. I am not suggesting that that method is appropriate for us today. It is not suited to advanced industrial democracies. The other method was to bring about through official “guidance” the rationing of bank credit in accordance with national targets and, where necessary, through quantitative direct controls. In the post-war period, that policy worked well in the UK for a quarter of a century, until the 1970s when it was steadily replaced by the purely market system of competition and credit control based exclusively on interest rates. In our experience of the past 30 or 40 years, that has proved deeply unstable, dysfunctional and profoundly costly.

Since then there have been sporadic attempts to create a safer banking system, but these have been deeply flawed. Regulation under the dictates of the neo-liberal ideology has been so light-touch—by new Labour just as much as by the other Government—that it has been entirely ineffective. Regulation has been too detailed. I remind the House that Basel III has more than 400 pages, and the US Dodd-Frank Bill has a staggering 8,000 pages or more. It is impossibly bureaucratic and almost certainly full of loopholes. Other regulation has been so cautious—for example, the Vickers commission proposal for Chinese walls between the investment and retail arms of a bank—that it missed the main point. Whatever regulatory safeguards the authorities put in place faced regulatory arbitrage from the phalanx of lawyers and accountants in the City earning their ill-gotten bonuses by unpicking or circumventing them.

[Mr Ronnie Campbell]

My right hon. Friend is always very good on these subjects. Would I be going too far if I were to suggest that we should nationalise the City, nationalise the banks and run ourselves a Government on behalf of the people?

[Mr Meacher]

Public ownership of the banks is a significant issue, but I am not going to propose it in my speech. It would be a mistake to return RBS and Lloyds to the private sector, and the arguments about Barclays and HSBC need to be made, but not in this debate. I shall suggest an alternative solution that removes the power of money creation from the banks and puts it in different hands to ensure better results in the national interest.

Against that background, there are solid grounds for examining—this is where I come to my proposal—the creation of a sovereign monetary system, as recommended by several expert commentators recently. Martin Wolf, who, as everyone in this House will know, is an influential chief economics commentator for the Financial Times, wrote an article a few months ago—on 24 April, to be precise—entitled “Strip private banks of their power to create money”. He recommends switching from bank-created debt to a nationalised money supply.

Lord Adair Turner, the former chair of the Financial Services Authority, delivered a speech about 18 months ago, in February 2013, discussing an alternative to quantitative easing that he termed “overt money finance,” which is also known as a from of sovereign money. Such a system—I will describe its main outline—would restrict the power to create all money to the state via the central bank. Changes to the rules governing how banks operate would still permit them to make loans, but would make it impossible for them to create new money in the process. The central bank would continue to follow the remit set by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, which is currently to deliver price stability, which is defined at the present time as an inflation target of 2%. The central bank would be exclusively responsible for creating as much new money as was necessary to support non-inflationary growth. Decisions on money creation would be taken independently of Government by a newly formed money creation committee or by the existing Monetary Policy Committee, either of which would be accountable to the Treasury Committee. Accountability to the House is crucial to the whole process.

amendment of the law

Ronnie Campbell Excerpts

Monday 24th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) (Lab)]

Sometimes I get a bit sick of hearing about the mess that the last Labour Government supposedly left. [Interruption.] Wait a minute. Perhaps it is America that should apologise to my right hon. Friend the Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown), because when Lehman Brothers crashed, it brought down the American economy. Northern Rock and all the other banks were investing in the sub-prime market to get a fast buck, and that brought down the banks here. I looked the other day at how much that cost the British taxpayer. It cost our economy £70 billion. When Members talk about the last Labour Government—

[Kwasi Kwarteng (Spelthorne) (Con)]

Spend, spend, spend.

[Mr Campbell]

No, we did not. When Members talk about the last Labour Government bringing down the economy, they are wrong. Let us have some truth and honesty about what happened to the economy at that time.

[Robert Flello]

My hon. Friend will remember as well as I do that when we were on the Government Benches, Conservative Members used to stand up and say, “Can we have a new this? Can we have a new that? Spend, spend, spend.”

[Mr Campbell]

According to the Conservatives, we should have wrapped the banks in red tape and nailed them to the floor. Would they have done that? Of course not. They would have done exactly what we did.

I want to get to the meat of the problem, so I will start with pensions. I am not a believer in a nanny state and never have been. If Members look at my record, they will see that I have voted against many such proposals. I looked at the pensions proposal carefully. I know a lot of pensioners who are not getting what they should be getting out of their pensions after they have bought an annuity.

The proposal reminds me of when I was a coal miner. When all the coal mines were closing, the Government decided that the miners could pull their pension out of the National Union of Mineworkers pension fund and put it into something else if they got a better deal. Of course, all the Scrooges came around, knocking at the doors of the miners. They said, “Will you organise a meeting?” Would I hell! They were there to grab the miners’ money. I am pleased that the Secretary of State for Transport is here, because he knows what I am talking about.

A lot of the men were bought. They pulled their money out of the miners’ pension scheme and put it into all sorts of finance companies that offered them a better deal. That did not last two years. Before long, they were all trying to get back into the scheme. The other schemes were a disaster. There was mis-selling on a big scale. The miners’ pension scheme had to be opened again so that the men could put their pensions back into it. They were given two years to do it. If they did not do it in that time, they were left with the company that they had gone with.

We have to be careful that that sort of mis-selling does not happen. I understand the problem. It is good that people can have control of their own money. I have no problem with that, but we might be stirring up a hornets’ nest. I do not trust the institutions one little bit.

On wages, we all know—it is a fact that is on record—that people who are working have lost out by £1,600 a year. People in two or three industries—especially those who work in local government, which we are talking about tonight—have not had a rise for three or four years. According to the latest figures that I have, £39 billion has been taken out of the economy since the austerity programme started because people have not got wage rises. It is no wonder that the economy is sluggish. If money is taken out of the economy, it will be sluggish. All that some workers have to look forward to is zero-hours contracts and food banks.

People do not realise what the welfare cap means or what it includes. Child benefit is capped. Incapacity benefit is capped. Winter fuel allowance is capped. Income support is capped. People do not realise what the cap means. There is a big figure, but people do not realise what is under it and what it means for them.

[Alec Shelbrooke]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Campbell]

No, I do not have time.

I got hold of a letter from the Department for Work and Pensions. It says that before the austerity measures were brought in, an average of 12,530 people on jobseeker’s allowance were sanctioned each month in north-east England. Under the new arrangements brought in by this Government, that has gone up to an average of 29,000 people a month. People are being sanctioned and do not have any money. That is why the food banks are increasing. People have no money and do not know where they will get their next meal, so they have to be sent to the food bank.

Some people are sanctioned fairly and some are rightly sanctioned. Like other Members, I have had many people come to my office who have never looked for a job. I tell them that they have to go out and look for a job—that even if it is a job as a brain surgeon, they should apply for it. A lot of people are not doing that, but a lot of people are and they are being sanctioned unfairly.

The borrowing requirements are a bit of a joke. In this year alone, the Government will borrow £50 billion. Perhaps that is where all the money is going. That will leave us £111 billion in debt. That is the situation that this country is in. If that is the economy getting better and if that is the country reducing the deficit, I will eat my hat. Quite honestly, I think that we are heading for the rocks or for a car crash—one or the other.

Autumn Statement

Ronnie Campbell Excerpts

Thursday 5th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

Mr Speaker, there are so many good things happening in Morecambe that I am not surprised my hon. Friend wants to bring them to the attention of the House. Under this Government, not only is unemployment down and not only will many businesses be helped by the measures we have announced today on business rates, but, as he said, the construction materials industry is doing well, as construction continues apace. If I come and visit the beautiful Morecambe bay area with him, I will ensure we pop into the brickworks.

[Mr Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) (Lab)]

Is it not the hard-working people of this country who have not had a wage rise for three years, the poor, the sick and the disabled who have had their benefits cut who are paying for this, while the Chancellor has been looking after his friends in the City—the spivs, the bankers with their big bonuses and those who are fiddling their taxes?

[Mr Osborne]

Presumably, those bankers the hon. Gentleman talks about are people such as Tony Blair and Peter Mandelson.

[Mr Campbell]

Them particularly.

[Mr Osborne]

“Them particularly”, said the hon. Gentleman, in case the Hansard reporters did not hear.

We have discussed what we can do for Blyth Valley and are setting up the enterprise zone in the port of Blyth. The hon. Gentleman could at least have acknowledged that unemployment has fallen by 21% in the last 12 months and youth unemployment by 22%.

Oral Answers to Questions

Ronnie Campbell Excerpts

Tuesday 5th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

The hon. Gentleman will know that such decisions are made by the independent regulators—in this case, the Prudential Regulation Authority, which has made the reasons for the decision absolutely clear.

[Mr Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) (Lab)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr George Osborne)]

The core purpose of the Treasury is to ensure the stability and prosperity of the economy. Today I can also announce another step in the fight against tax evasion. This afternoon we will sign a tax information-sharing agreement with the Cayman Islands—the first ever with an overseas territory. As a result, information on UK taxpayers held in the Cayman Islands will automatically be provided to Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, which will use it to collect the tax that is due.

[Mr Campbell]

Is it still the Chancellor’s intention to withdraw jobseeker’s allowance from all young people under the age of 25?

[Mr Osborne]

That is not part of the Government’s programme. We are seeking to help young people into work through the Work programme and the Youth Contract. The good news is that the youth claimant count has fallen by many tens of thousands. I would have thought that the hon. Gentleman would use this opportunity to get up and point out that unemployment has fallen in his constituency over the last year, and there are—[Interruption.] Unemployment has fallen in his constituency, and every job created is one that he should be celebrating. He should remind his constituents of the enormous damage done to the north-east economy by the previous Labour Government.

Banking Reform

Ronnie Campbell Excerpts

Monday 4th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

I will certainly pass on my hon. Friend’s comments to my right hon. Friend the Chancellor. What we are saying when it comes to the regulation of payment systems is that, through the Bill, we will set up a regulatory responsibility to promote competition on the part of the regulator of payment systems. One thing regulators will want to look at is how they can quickly make accounts portable between customers. That, however, is only one of the innovations that could be made. I mentioned in my response to the urgent question the requirement to speed up the clearing of cheques. My hon. Friend will recall that the Payments Council once introduced a statement—almost ex cathedra—to the effect that cheques would be abolished in future. What kind of contempt for the consumer does that show? It should not happen again, and it will not happen again.

[Mr Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) (Lab)]

Why are we pussyfooting with these banks? Why not just nationalise them and make them into a good public service? After all, we own half of them.

[Greg Clark]

As a result of the chaos of the previous Government, we almost ended up nationalising the banks. I want to see our banks back in the private sector; I want to see them competitive; I want to see them making money, providing jobs and getting credit to businesses and consumers.

Autumn Statement

Ronnie Campbell Excerpts

Wednesday 5th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

I am not sure that I can add much to that, except to say that I completely agree with my hon. Friend.

[Mr Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) (Lab)]

I have heard mention of at least a dozen Tory MPs in marginal seats getting a lot of money, but I have not heard much about the north-east getting money. I hope the Chancellor will not come and give us what he gave us last year, when he said that the port of Blyth was going to get an enterprise zone. We have 14 hectares. We have put a fence around it and made it into an allotment garden.

[Mr Osborne]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his assiduous campaign for an enterprise zone in the port of Blyth. That enterprise zone is going ahead. As a Conservative Chancellor, may I also congratulate him on his campaign, along with many other hon. Members, for the dualling of the A1 all the way to Newcastle? Since I know that Blyth is north of Newcastle, I point out that, as I said to my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith), we are looking at further dualling to the Scottish border, but that is for another time.

Finance Bill

Ronnie Campbell Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd July 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Hoban]

I will give way to the hon. Gentleman; otherwise he might explode.

[Mr Campbell]

When the Minister talks about the economic mess, does he mean the £600 billion that the Labour Government had to give to the banks to bail them out and keep them afloat?

[Mr Hoban]

The UK economy has suffered hugely as a consequence of the financial crisis. It has lost £140 billion in growth. We have to tackle the causes of that failure, as well as tackling the deficit that the previous Government left behind. That is what we are doing through the Financial Services Bill, which is passing through Parliament at the moment.