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Salmond draws up Scots case for HBOS takeover



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Published Date: 29 September 2008
By CLAIRE GARDNER
THE First Minister's economic advisers will meet in private this week to discuss the controversial plan for Lloyds TSB to take over HBOS – to help form Alex Salmond's business case for Scotland.
The First Minister wants to retain headquarters functions and jobs at the Bank of Scotland's traditional home on the Mound in Edinburgh if the £12.2 billion takeover goes ahead.

There have been calls for public access to the council of economic
advisers meeting, which will be held at Dumfries House in Ayrshire on Friday – so the Scottish public can judge what it is doing to defend jobs and investment.

Yesterday, HBOS communications manager Shane O'Riordain insisted the proposed takeover was being done for commercial reasons and not, as widely claimed, a rescue package. He said: "We put sentiment aside, as you must do in business, and we took the view that this was right. Don't judge this deal on the headlines of the last week, that's not what business is about. Judge it on where this business will be in two or three years' time. We believe this will be a very strong franchise, good for Scotland."

Meanwhile, one of Scotland's leading business academics, Professor Stewart Hamilton, has said not one of the 15 board directors of HBOS should be allowed to join the board of the merged Lloyds Halifax banking and financial services group.

The professor of finance and accounting at the leading European business school, IMD, based in Lausanne, Switzerland, said: "I don't think a single member of the HBOS board should remain a member, if this deal goes through for them.

"For them to have appointed Andy Hornby, a non-banker, as chief executive was sheer folly. It's extraordinary that they appointed someone with such limited knowledge of the banking sector."





The full article contains 305 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
Page 1 of 1

  • Last Updated: 28 September 2008 9:52 PM
  • Source: The Scotsman
  • Location: Edinburgh
  • Related Topics: Halifax Bank of Scotland
 
1

First Minister,

Markinch 29/09/2008 00:19:01
I think that Colin Matthews should lead a rival bid, to regain The Bank Of Scotland as an Independent Bank once again, however i fear that The "Haliban" have asset stripped The BOS functionality in Scotland, remocing key services such as Gruop Prop, Card Services, Security, etc.
2

Brian Hill,

29/09/2008 00:42:52
Not a done deal by any stretch of the imagination. Trust AS to get the best deal possible for Scotland out of this skull duggery.
3

frank mcbride,

lusitania 29/09/2008 01:42:40
#2, Brian.

Your hope of getting to the bottom of this skullduggery is about equal to that of the Wilson Administration publishing the McCrone Report.

I ask the question: was this Brown "doing anything to preserve the Union"?
4

Tynietiger,

29/09/2008 08:57:16
What we need is independence with full fiscal powers.

Just look at Norway it has a Central Bank and NO BANKING CRISIS. It is not a universal global problem as Brown and Darling like to say to avoid the blame for their lax regulations.
5

Calvinist,

29/09/2008 08:58:29
Is one of these 'economic advisers' the hedge-fund manager (i.e. spiv) Sir George Mathewson? I wonder how much he gave to the SNP campaign fund?
6

noswod,

Honestus 29/09/2008 09:34:00
Even a MBA teacher says that it was madness to put a so called Harvard educated grocer and cement maker "Hornby" as chief executive of a Bank. All the HBOS board and the senior executives should be sacked, they have lost the bank and must pay the price like the 40,000 HBOS staff who will go. HBOS are really bring out their management firepower to justify the surrender viz a vie the parading of their PR supremo Shane in the media. He has no knowledge of Lloyds TSB plans their management and where the £1bn savings will come from. The Scottish media should not even speak/publish his utterences. Victor Blank TSB Chairman is the only man that should spoken to. He should be dragged screaming in front of the Scottish Parliament to give speciifc legal committments on the slash and burn strategy to be adopted to Scotlands oldest bank, so at least a £1bn can be saved. This is what happens, even in the USA, the rich & powerful have to justify their position to the people, Vic starting off with a statement that the HBOS board get nothing out of the takeover would be a start. Hows aboot Fat Cat, Think elctric car driving Street having to meet Scotland Street. Not much chance of that Vic Cumberland is too busy to meet "Scotsmen & Women" as for any legal committment to the Scotties not to burn the place doon, and meet the people in a parliament naye chance whats yer name again, ah yes Alex.
7

Auld Twa,

Edinburgh 29/09/2008 10:49:32
Agreed, sack the lot, they have let us all down.
Maybe this would bring a touch of the real world to boardrooms around the financial sector.
8

Jamiem,

29/09/2008 11:26:29
No 1 - how do you propose this new independent bank funds itself? As I understand it the combined HBOS is already relying heavily on deposits from Halifax customers to keep its liquidity ratios in check - if BOS is independent, it will not have access to those to support its retail and business loans and so will have to plug a large funding gap?

And keeping jobs at The Mound isn't going to make much difference as hardly anyone works there!
9

Arfur,

29/09/2008 13:17:08
Glad to see AS doing something to keep jobs in Scotland.

When GB brokered this deal did he even bother to ask if jobs could stay in Scotland? My foot he did.
10

Martyk,

29/09/2008 18:02:10
I cant see how a newly independent BOS could survive. The brand is surely tainted beyond recovery.
11

Raymond Thomas Brooke,

Leven England 29/09/2008 21:03:23
No one listened when Halifax Share holders wanted the HQ to remain in Halifax so why should The HQ remain in Edinburgh.
However what happens now will soon be overturned when Lloyd need to rationalise on commercial grounds so GB and AS effort will be in vain
12

Fairfax,

30/09/2008 10:09:15
Tynietiger (4): "Just look at Norway it has a Central Bank and NO BANKING CRISIS."

For Norway, this might be because it had its banking crisis in the early 1990s. Here's their central bank describing the resolution of that crisis, when some 2/3 of their banking system failed and three of their largest banks were nationalized:

http://www.norges-bank.no/templates/article____13822.aspx

In short, independence is not sufficient to protect nations from banking crises.
13

Ike,

Glasgow 30/09/2008 13:54:55
Greedy and delusional managers/directors/politicians always distort banking which remains a very simple business. A bank takes deposits and issues loans and notes which become "money'. The key rule is that notes or money must circulate because all deposits or savings cannot be recovered at the same time, having been loaned out. The current crisis has been caused by the sheer incompetence of the current class of banking/financial executives, including regulators who forgot - or have never learned - the fundamentals and the purpose of banks. Stellar incompetents are those responsible for hiring the obviously unqualified CEO of HBOS, the demutualisation spivs and the ignorant or complicit regulators.


.
14

read_to_the_end,

Edinburgh 01/10/2008 10:19:26
In a situation as bad as this posturing by Salmond and his rich banking friends threatens the very survival of HBOS. How will its collapse help Scotland?

Like many people I was glad to see the back of the previous Labour-LD Coalition and inclined to give the Nationalists their chance. They have depended heavily on that kind of half-support.

What I did not want to see was this kind of self-defeating "Little Scotland" policy. The SNP will pay a big price if HBOS falls.

 

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