Royal Bank of Scotland

Debate between Steve Baker and Jon Cruddas

Thursday 5th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman that this is a live issue on the right, and I, too, would like to see a much more diverse banking sector. Let me bring him back to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (Jeremy Quin). Is it not a problem for the hon. Gentleman and me, and for all those who want a more diverse, more co-operative and mutual banking sector, that the entire atmosphere of co-operative banking in the UK has been established by the circumstances of our own Co-operative bank?

[Jon Cruddas]

The hon. Gentleman seems to be hiding behind one example when all the evidence across western market economies suggests that more co-operative banking does indeed have a part play in creating a more resilient modern capitalism.

What does all this mean for RBS? The Government have presented an artificial choice between business as usual with taxpayer ownership and business as usual with private ownership. This could be deemed outdated thinking. We need so much more imagination and so much more ambition if we are really going to build a better banking system. We urgently need to nurture new kinds of bank that exist in almost every other developed economy—banks that are rooted in local communities, accountable to more than quarterly profit figures, focused on supporting real economic activity, and run with an ethic of public service attached to them. The reason this debate is so obviously important is that with economists the world over warning that the next financial crisis could be just round the corner, the stakes literally could not be higher.