Financial Services Bill

My Lords, having not spoken at Second Reading, I had not intended to intervene in the debate. However, I could not agree more with the noble Lord who said that it is all a question of management—that the management has to be good in any bank—and I speak from some experience as chairman of a smaller bank. It is quite clear that in the Royal Bank of Scotland, and in all other banks, the board has a definite responsibility for curbing the greed of people within the bank who want it to get bigger and bigger—and then it all fails. If a bank’s board was doing its job properly, the management of the bank would be good. When it becomes poor, that is when the troubles we have seen, particularly in two Scottish banks, arise.