Noel to meet HBOS scandal banker in jail
NOEL Edmonds is set to visit Wandsworth prison to meet one of the men at the heart of the HBOS scandal as part of his legal investigation into the bank’s activities, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.
The former Deal Or No Deal presenter is among dozens of small business owners demanding compensation for his treatment at the hands of HBOS bankers.
The meeting, scheduled for October 22, will put Edmonds face to face with Michael Bancroft, who was jailed in February last year.
Edmonds believes Bancroft may be able to assist him as he prepares to launch a claim of up to £300million against Lloyds Banking Group, the owner of HBOS, in London’s High Court.
The former BBC presenter said he would attend the meeting accompanied by his legal advisers.
He said: ‘My legal team will spend time with Michael to ascertain what information he can provide about the criminal activity revealed in the Turnbull Report [a whistleblower’s report that accused executives at Lloyds and HBOS of a cover-up] and its impact both on me and my companies. I look forward to meeting him.’
Bancroft, 75, was locked up for ten years for his part in the HBOS Reading scandal. He was sentenced alongside five others following a fourmonth trial at Southwark Crown Court. He was convicted of conspiracy to corrupt, three counts of fraudulent trading and conspiracy to conceal criminal property.
Bancroft, who worked at Quayside Corporate Services (QCS) with David Mills, was found in court to have ‘plundered’ HBOS small businesses clients for fees and assets.
Edmonds claims that an HBOS manager, Mark Dobson, who was jailed for four-and-a-half years, destroyed his entertainment business Unique Group.
Together the ‘HBOS Six’ conspired to enrich themselves while driving small businesses into the ground, the court found last year.
Under the scheme, former banker David Mills bribed HBOS manager Lynden Scourfield with holidays and sex parties so that he would force struggling business customers into engaging the services of Quayside Corporate Services, the consultancy business run by Mills and Bancroft. Scourfield lent the businesses large sums of money, which could never realistically be repaid, enabling Mills and his associates – including Bancroft – to charge high consultancy service fees.
In the months after Scourfield, Dobson and Bancroft were sent to prison, Lloyds launched a scheme to compensate victims of HBOS.
However, Edmonds pulled out of mediation talks to settle his own claim last November. Edmonds feared he would not be compensated ‘swiftly, fairly and appropriately’ by Lloyds, and announced plans to sue the bank in court.
Nearly a year on, lawyers for Edmonds say his High Court claim for compensation is likely to be lodged in mid-November. The date was scheduled for this month, but was postponed when Bancroft offered to meet Edmonds.
In a statement from Wandsworth prison, Bancroft last night claimed that he was ‘ignored’ when raising concerns with ‘senior managers at HBOS/Lloyds’ about goings-on at the bank’s Reading office.
He added: ‘I have offered to assist Noel Edmonds in his claim against the bank because I have no doubt that he too is an HBOS/ Lloyds fraud victim – like hundreds of others, even though the fraud against him did not feature in the criminal proceedings [last year].
‘I have offered to meet him so that I can tell him all that I know about both the very close relationship that existed between Mark Dobson and David Mills and Lloyds’ efforts to cover up the crime against him.’
Jonathan Coad of Keystone Law, acting for Edmonds, added: ‘I am delighted that Michael Bancroft has offered to help us, and I understand that he will be able to give me more details about the cover-up of which we and many others… say Lloyds is guilty.’
A spokesman for Lloyds denied allegations of a cover-up, and dismissed Bancroft as ‘a convicted criminal who the judge described as a thoroughly dishonest man’.
They said: ‘In April 2017, Lloyds Banking Group appointed Dame Linda Dobbs, a retired judge, to undertake an independent review to consider whether the issues relating to HBOS impaired assets office in Reading were investigated and appropriately reported to authorities at the time by Lloyds Banking Group, following its acquisition of HBOS in 2009.
‘We are determined to get to the bottom of what happened in HBOS Reading and we are assisting Dame Linda Dobbs fully with her review, which is ongoing.’
The spokesman added: ‘Mr Edmonds has yet to file the legal claim which he has repeatedly threatened. If he does, it will be contested.’