Monday, May 23, 2011

Banks under fire again for missing small firms loan target (Guardian)

Anger from MPs and pressure groups as banks admit falling short on politically
sensitive ?19bn Project Merlin pledge

Britain's banks will be back in the firing line this week as they admit to
falling short on a politically sensitive pledge to step up lending to
struggling small and medium-sized businesses.

In the first three months of the Project Merlin pact ? which also included a
pledge on bonuses and jobs ? the banks had committed to lend ?19bn to small
firms. Figures to be released by the Bank of England tomorrow are expected to
reveal a shortfall of about ?2bn.

Lord Oakeshott, who resigned as a Liberal Democrat treasury spokesman in the
Lords over the project, called it "Project Mirage, not Project Merlin". He
said the banks must "stop pretending and start lending".

At the same time, the New Economics Foundation (Nef) and leftwing campaign
group Compass are joining forces to push for a more radical blueprint for bank
reform than that proposed by the government-commissioned Vickers report.

Instead of the Chinese walls advocated by Vickers and his colleagues, who
published their proposals last month, Nef and Compass, which are hosting a
"Good Banking" summit on Wednesday, ...
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