Phil Boswell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Phil Boswell on 2016-04-18.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment his Department has made on the potential selling price of the Government’s remaining stake in the Royal Bank of Scotland of the implications for the leveraged loans made by that bank to the oil and gas sector of the default rate of companies in that sector on high-yield loans.

Harriett Baldwin

The Government’s shareholding in RBS is managed at arm’s length from HM Treasury by UK Financial Investments (UKFI). However, UKFI’s role is to manage the investment, not the bank. RBS retains its own independent Board of Directors. Commercial decisions such as lending remain the responsibility of the bank’s independent management team and not the Government.