Daily Express

Banks need more competitio­n, says TSB boss

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THE boss of TSB has hit out at plans to spare Royal Bank of Scotland ( RBS) from selling off its Williams & Glyn network, adding that competitio­n concerns will not be addressed by a £ 750million pot of Government money for challenger banks.

Paul Pester told reporters that the high street lender is speaking with the Treasury and European Commission as part of a review of the multimilli­on- pound programme that aims to meet RBS’s state aid conditions without selling Williams & Glyn.

He said: “Clearly we’ve been successful in creating TSB out of Lloyds and creating a new challenger bank.

“If that’s not to happen with Williams & Glyn through the creation of an independen­t bank, what’s important is that we still get more competitio­n.”

The Government says the £ 750million will help challenger banks access cash for increasing their business banking operations, and woo small and medium- sized enterprise ( SME) clients to switch accounts from RBS. Another pot of cash will invest in fintech firms. However, Mr Pester said one- off funding is not enough to tackle market dominance by Britain’s big five banks. He said: “If RBS takes £ 750million and just gives it to the challenger banks, what benefit is that? Writing us a cheque of £ 100million would be very interestin­g, but it won’t do much for competitio­n.”

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