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TOPICAL DEBATES Financial Stability

The Financial Secretary mentioned the need for bold action. In his statement yesterday, the Chancellor said that he had frozen the assets of the subsidiaries of Landsbanki in this country as a first step in trying to address the issue of retail deposits at that bank. However, he was not so clear about what was intended in respect of local authority deposits with the bank. My local authority, the London borough of Sutton, has £5.5 million in a subsidiary of that company. It was invested in a prudent fashion and in line with guidelines issued by the Treasury. The authority wants to know what will happen to that money and whether the Government will stand with it and council tax payers to make sure that the money is safe.