Oaten gets Tough with Government on Banks

Winchester MP Mark Oaten is increasing the pressure on the Government regarding the details of their economic recovery plans and their relationship with the banks raising a series of questions in Parliament.

Mark has been asking the hard questions of Government to try and unravel the detail of the banking crisis and unearth where the money is being spent, on whom and how quickly.

His offices have received hundreds of letters, emails and phone calls from constituents quite understandably concerned about the state of the economy and angry with the Government.

With the small matter of bonus payments to be decided by the banks Mark has made it clear that for any bank the Government has taken a stake in it should use its leverage to far greater affect.  

Mark has today tabled a Parliamentary Question regarding the winding up of Kaupthing, Singer & Friedlander, one of the failed Icelandic banks, to ask the Government how much the legal and accountancy fees involved have cost so far. Mark has championed the cause of local hospice Naomi House, which has lost £5.7m – a third of its resources – in the failed bank.

This comes a day after a question Mark attempted to table in Parliament on RBS was rejected due to the Government not answering questions on the operational matters of the banks. Mark had wanted to ask how many loan requests had been received by RBS from small and medium sized businesses and how many of these had been refused, but was not allowed to do so.

With local businesses coming to him every week for help Mark is trying to raise the issue of accountability of Government policies to banks within Parliament. Where the Government has bailed out a bank with huge amounts of taxpayers money, such as RBS, he believes they have a duty to answer questions about its operations.

The Winchester MP has also been forced to take the unusual step of tabling further questions to ask Ministers when they intend to answer his previous questions on the Governments Small Business Finance Scheme.

Mark tabled a number of questions on the scheme, aimed to provide financial help to SME’s, last year and they were due for answer in December. The questions sought to unravel when the first payments under the scheme would be made and what businesses would be entitled to apply under it.

Two months later with no sign of an answer Mark has had to table follow up questions asking the Government when they intend to provide him with a response.

Mark Oaten stated:

“Hopefully everyone knows that myself and other MP’s are working hard to get the Government to support Naomi House and the good work it is doing. But I am also trying to pick apart the details of all these Government initiatives and announcements.

“We always hear these grand announcements from the Government – and some of them are very welcome – but they have to be made to work. We really need to question the detail of these schemes to find out who it is actually going to help and where all the money is going.

“That isn’t made easy when the Government don’t allow you to ask questions on RBS or other banks or when they simply just don’t answer them. They can’t just ignore the problem and hope we will stop asking.   

The Questions:

The relevant questions are:

(To the Department for Business & Enterprise)

• When he expects the first payments to be issued under the Small Business Finance Scheme.

• When will businesses be entitled to apply for the Small Business Finance Scheme

• What additional resources he is putting in to ensure applications for the Small Business Finance Scheme are processed smoothly.

(To the Treasury)

• how many loan requests have been received by Royal Bank of Scotland from small and medium sized businesses in the last three months; and (2) how many were refused.

• What estimate he has made of the monthly costs of the legal and accountancy fees involved in the administration of Kaupthing Singer and Friedlander.