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Banking Bill

Amendment 174BA 174BA: After Clause 226, insert the following new Clause— ““Transparency: report to Parliament on financial assistance (1) The Treasury shall prepare and lay before each House of Parliament a monthly report in respect of— (a) financial assistance paid out under subsection (1) of section 225, (b) loans made under section 226, (c) guarantees, indemnities or similar arrangements which may result in amounts being paid out under subsection (1) of section 225. (2) A report for a month shall show the transactions entered into under each of paragraphs (a) to (c) of subsection (1) during that month together with the totals made or outstanding as at the end of the month. (3) The reference in subsection (2) to totals made or outstanding means— (a) in relation to loans, the amount of principal and accrued interest which has not been repaid, (b) in relation to guarantees, the gross amounts of the guarantees, indemnities or similar arrangements which might be payable, (c) in any other case, the amount paid or committed on a cumulative basis. (4) The Treasury shall ensure that the report contains sufficient detail to enable Parliament to understand the actual and potential commitment of public money to financial assistance and the Treasury may summarise the individual items which fall to be disclosed in a report in whatever way they consider appropriate in order to assist Parliament in that regard. (5) If the Treasury consider that certain information should not be disclosed in a report on public interest grounds, a report— (a) may omit that information until such time as the Treasury consider that the public interest is no longer affected, and (b) must contain a statement that the Treasury has not disclosed information in accordance with this subsection. (6) A report shall not be required for any month in respect of which there have been no material changes since the last report made under this section.””