McFall backs motion to split banking units
TREASURY committee chairman John McFall yesterday threw his weight behind a House of Commons motion calling for banks’ retail and investment banking “casino” operations to be split.
Labour MP McFall – noted for his scathing attacks on bankers’ behaviour during Treasury committee sessions – seconded an early-day motion tabled by Alun Michael MP, the chair of the Christian Socialist Movement (CSM).
Michael, who is leading the campaign, said he was calling for immediate action to “stop the banks gambling with our money”, adding that separating bank activities was “not just an economic issue but a moral one”.
McFall, also a member of the CSM, said: “An ever-present danger exists when banks combine this casino banking with traditional retail deposits which are rightly guaranteed by the taxpayer.”
And he warned that losses in investment banking could potentially lead to a situation in which “UK taxpayers would have yet again to pump in tens of billions of pounds to rescue such a combined bank”.
“We cannot allow this to happen again,” he added.