BARCLAYS BANK, LIBOR AND REPUBLICAN DONATIONS
- Session: 2012-13
- Date tabled: 16.07.2012
- Primary sponsor:
- Sponsors:
That this House notes that Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney is to host a private fundraising dinner in London prior to the Olympics; understands that according to reports in the Financial Times of 3 July tickets to the dinner are being sold at between $25,000 and $75,000 per head; further understands that the event is being chaired by several senior banking executives and lobbyists; furthernotes that the recently departed Barclays Chief Executive Bob Diamond and other existing senior Barclays executives have played a prominent role in fundraising efforts for the Romney campaign; further understands that at least 15 of Barclays Capital's most senior bankers based in the US have donated the maximum allowable individual donation per election to the Romney campaign; further understands Barclays' Head of Government Policy and Finance group has already raised $927,000 for the Romney campaign; further notes the recent revelation of the destructive role Barclays has played in the international LIBOR-setting scandal; recognises fears that hundreds of thousands of borrowers and mortgage owners in the UK could have been adversely affected; believes that Barclays comprehensively failed to work in the interests ofits customers; furtherbelieves Barclays senior executives continue to not fully appreciate the consequences of the actions and behaviour of the financial sector in causing the global banking crash in 2007-08, which ordinary working people are now paying for; and calls on Barclays and its executives to cease fundraising for political candidates immediately and to concentrate entirely on repairing confidence and trust in the banking system instead.