Browse content similar to Andrea Leadsom - British Conservative MP. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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One of Britain's foremost political magazines, the Spectator, name and | :00:18. | :00:26. | |
my guest today as their new, of the year. She is a backbench | :00:26. | :00:30. | |
Conservative MP. She was described as a potent mix of authority, | :00:31. | :00:34. | |
restless this and feel it is. She has been causing trouble for the | :00:34. | :00:39. | |
Prime Minister, putting against him on Europe and drawn up a plan on | :00:39. | :00:46. | |
how he should repatriate powers from Europe. She has also been | :00:46. | :00:49. | |
making suggestions on the way London's banks have been working. | :00:49. | :00:59. | |
:00:59. | :01:15. | ||
How does she think they should Andrea leads and, welcome to | :01:15. | :01:22. | |
HARDtalk. Thank you. -- Andrea Leadsom. American politicians said | :01:22. | :01:27. | |
that every big trading disaster happened in London. There was a | :01:27. | :01:33. | |
point when it did feel like that, wasn't there? There was. Obviously | :01:33. | :01:38. | |
London is the world's leading global centre. The US has a problem | :01:38. | :01:42. | |
with that but a lot of activity takes place here. That is because | :01:42. | :01:48. | |
we have got the right language, a good times on and we have got | :01:48. | :01:52. | |
London, the city poor people want to come and live. It is not | :01:52. | :01:56. | |
surprising that this is the world's global training centre. We have had | :01:56. | :02:02. | |
our fair share of scandals. There was JP Morgan, HSBC facing | :02:02. | :02:08. | |
allegations that failed to stop Mexican drug money. A lot of banks | :02:08. | :02:12. | |
have London operations in the frame. Is there a problem that the | :02:12. | :02:18. | |
culture? There has been. The key issue has been the build-up of a | :02:18. | :02:24. | |
huge oligopoly of banking in London. It started in the 1990s, when I was | :02:24. | :02:30. | |
running the team at Barclays. We saw on enormous number of mergers. | :02:30. | :02:35. | |
A lot of brand-names and fund managers as smaller banks and | :02:35. | :02:39. | |
building societies all been bought up. We have got a real oligopoly of | :02:39. | :02:45. | |
banks. Perhaps five major banks with 89 % of all personal current | :02:45. | :02:50. | |
account customers. There is a great concentration in the UK. As we know, | :02:50. | :02:55. | |
over the last decade, they have built up enormous leverage. | :02:56. | :03:00. | |
Regulation was fairly tight. Certainly not focused on the right | :03:00. | :03:05. | |
areas, which is the massive expansion of balance sheets and the | :03:05. | :03:09. | |
amount of risk-taking in global markets that was going on in the UK. | :03:09. | :03:15. | |
The position we found ourselves in, one analyst said that he had never | :03:15. | :03:21. | |
known it so bad. Is that how you feel about the situation of her | :03:21. | :03:27. | |
banking is in London? I think it has changed a great deal now since | :03:27. | :03:31. | |
the financial crisis. In the build- up to the financial crisis, there | :03:31. | :03:34. | |
was a huge amount of positions taken on which were funded by | :03:34. | :03:38. | |
overnight loans from other banks. It was about leverage. He was | :03:38. | :03:42. | |
talking about the scandals of the summer where particular things were | :03:42. | :03:48. | |
going wrong in bangs. He argued it was worse than 2008, the height of | :03:48. | :03:52. | |
the crisis. His argument was to do with some of the scandals, not | :03:52. | :04:01. | |
least the libel. I would say that lie boar was symptomatic off a | :04:01. | :04:06. | |
culture of making money and, therefore, perhaps, elbowing out of | :04:06. | :04:10. | |
the way be good procedures, the good compliance officers and all of | :04:10. | :04:14. | |
the other role of banking pictures risk-management. Certainly, | :04:14. | :04:18. | |
anecdotally, I have heard from a number of people I have met through | :04:18. | :04:22. | |
my work in the Treasury Select Committee and outside of that, | :04:22. | :04:26. | |
people from my banking days, they say that risk officers were | :04:26. | :04:30. | |
undermined because banks were making so much money that they did | :04:30. | :04:33. | |
not need to abide by the rules. That is a big mistake, once you | :04:33. | :04:39. | |
allow that culture to take hold. The way should explain be a talking | :04:39. | :04:46. | |
about the rate set by the banks what interest rates are. You are on | :04:46. | :04:49. | |
the Treasury Select Committee who looked into this. Afterwards you | :04:49. | :04:53. | |
said that politicians are useless a getting to the truth behind the | :04:53. | :04:58. | |
scandal, despite all your grilling and questioning of the likes of Bob | :04:58. | :05:03. | |
Diamond. What I actually said was that on that occasion, when Bob | :05:03. | :05:07. | |
Diamond came before us, that someone could accuse us of having | :05:07. | :05:12. | |
been useless because we had no time to prepare. The issue with select | :05:12. | :05:15. | |
committees is very often that they call an inquiry because something | :05:15. | :05:19. | |
is very topical and there is not the time to get the in-depth | :05:19. | :05:24. | |
information. Certainly for me, because I had been involved in many | :05:24. | :05:28. | |
markets in my early twenties, it is very clear to me that in a dealing | :05:28. | :05:31. | |
room, compliance officers us sitting there. You also have a | :05:31. | :05:35. | |
morning meeting over the Tannoy per you talk about what is going on on | :05:35. | :05:39. | |
the markets. We are not have the availability of any information | :05:39. | :05:45. | |
about how things were recorded, were at their concerns about the | :05:45. | :05:49. | |
way the rate was fixed? In terms of that first meeting, we were not | :05:49. | :05:52. | |
prepared for it in a sense of having background information. | :05:52. | :05:56. | |
Since then, it has been the Commission for banking standards | :05:56. | :06:00. | |
which has looked into this. There was a suggestion from a colleague | :06:00. | :06:04. | |
of years that you and he had been blocked from the commission, | :06:04. | :06:09. | |
despite being, in his words, the obvious candidates for being on the | :06:09. | :06:14. | |
commission. He seems to suggest it would be a whitewash and which were | :06:14. | :06:19. | |
both too outspoken. Was he right? There are good people on the | :06:19. | :06:25. | |
commission. Because it was a joint committee of the House of Lords and | :06:25. | :06:29. | |
the House of Commons, it could only take a small number of members of | :06:29. | :06:35. | |
each party. Would you have liked to have been on it? Of course. | :06:35. | :06:39. | |
have experience because you were in Barclays, working in Berkeley's for | :06:39. | :06:44. | |
25 years in the city. Barclays weren't the only culprit. Sure. | :06:45. | :06:48. | |
Certainly there are other people with good experience. That is the | :06:48. | :06:53. | |
way the cookie crumbles. suggestion it could end up being of | :06:53. | :06:57. | |
white washed, that they would get to the bottom. I don't agree with | :06:57. | :07:03. | |
that. I am feeling very satisfied. I am about to give evidence myself | :07:03. | :07:10. | |
on the subject of bank account accountability. I think that is -- | :07:10. | :07:14. | |
portability. That is an example of how detailed they want to get. | :07:15. | :07:18. | |
There are looking into issues around competition, which is | :07:18. | :07:21. | |
something that we and the Treasury Select Committee have tried to | :07:21. | :07:25. | |
highlight as one of the critical problems of planting in the UK | :07:25. | :07:29. | |
today. You have clear ideas about what should happen. -- banking. You | :07:29. | :07:33. | |
want to make sure we do not see these problems again. There is this | :07:33. | :07:39. | |
idea that you could just leave your bank account. Yes. The. Macabre | :07:39. | :07:45. | |
bank accounts is 55 % of people have never switch back to Cowes. | :07:46. | :07:49. | |
Most people see it as complicated because you have to change your | :07:49. | :07:54. | |
number, your details, your standing orders and so on. We have this | :07:54. | :07:59. | |
oligopoly of banks who each have a Clearing system instead what we | :07:59. | :08:05. | |
could do, to create a shared central utility into which every | :08:05. | :08:10. | |
bank could hold their bank accounts. Then, in effect, you would | :08:10. | :08:15. | |
completely remove the barriers of entry for new banks and be as | :08:15. | :08:20. | |
customers could move bank accounts over night every day of the week if | :08:20. | :08:23. | |
they wanted, keeping the same details. Standing orders would not | :08:23. | :08:28. | |
have to be moved and so on. want the entrance and the market. | :08:28. | :08:33. | |
That is the key to this. We have ended up in a position where we | :08:33. | :08:37. | |
have too small a number of very powerful banks and the culture has | :08:37. | :08:42. | |
been wrong. There is a custom -- custom of poor customer service. | :08:42. | :08:47. | |
Many people are angry. It is one of our key strategic industries. It | :08:47. | :08:54. | |
employs over one million people. It generates around 11 % of tax take. | :08:54. | :08:59. | |
Yet, people are furious with banks because they see them as having so | :08:59. | :09:05. | |
badly damaged the economy. I think if we saw a raft of new entrants, | :09:05. | :09:12. | |
not just new medium-sized players, Bergin money, Metro Bank, also, | :09:12. | :09:17. | |
some new regional banks as a new community banks, specialist lending | :09:17. | :09:21. | |
banks and the like, that requires an absolute removal of the barriers | :09:21. | :09:25. | |
to entry. The Independent Commission on | :09:25. | :09:28. | |
banking has looked at this and decided not to recommend the | :09:28. | :09:32. | |
introduction of portable accounts. Can you change their mind? That is | :09:32. | :09:36. | |
what I am open. It was there because commission that looked at | :09:36. | :09:41. | |
this issue of accountability. He decided to go for a 7-day switching | :09:41. | :09:45. | |
process, which simply means you have to move your bank accounts and | :09:45. | :09:50. | |
standing orders but you do it faster. What I am arguing, and I am | :09:50. | :09:57. | |
not alone, is that a huge raft of the Challenger banks, the likes of | :09:57. | :10:06. | |
bridging Money and Meadowbank, who are keen to be able to access a | :10:06. | :10:10. | |
Clearing System and properly offer a service to their customers... At | :10:10. | :10:15. | |
the moment, if you are a bank to clear as with RBS, when they had | :10:15. | :10:19. | |
their problem a couple of months ago but their processing system and | :10:19. | :10:24. | |
in they are completely packed up for two weeks, that affects all of | :10:24. | :10:30. | |
the banks. -- system in India. For those new bands, it is essential | :10:30. | :10:34. | |
they get direct access to systems so they can offer better service to | :10:34. | :10:40. | |
customers. You would favour of splitting it in the retail and | :10:40. | :10:46. | |
that has not stopped banks filling in the past. Look at Northern Rock. | :10:46. | :10:52. | |
Why should it make a difference? don't she usually support the idea | :10:52. | :11:00. | |
of a complete split. -- usually. What I have said is that refill | :11:00. | :11:06. | |
ring-fencing is all very well. You get some of the disadvantages of | :11:06. | :11:12. | |
splitting without the advantages. If you have a fenced Bank, there | :11:12. | :11:16. | |
are ways you can push the boundaries. If you are a retail | :11:16. | :11:20. | |
bank, if your corporate customers want to do for an exchange with you, | :11:21. | :11:25. | |
do they have to open a new account of your investment banker not? If | :11:25. | :11:30. | |
you have separated those two things, you don't have the grey area, you | :11:30. | :11:35. | |
have a clear answer. You increase the risk of moral hazard. This is | :11:35. | :11:39. | |
an argument made by the chief executive of RBS, Stephen Hester, | :11:39. | :11:44. | |
he says you must be careful because people can be made bankrupt by the | :11:44. | :11:49. | |
Government. If you are art retail ring-fenced banks, you are too big | :11:49. | :11:54. | |
to fail. Two important to fail. If you are rational customer, you | :11:54. | :11:59. | |
would want to bank with that ring- fenced bank on the grounds that she | :11:59. | :12:03. | |
would be bailed out in the event of a problem. Inadvertently, you give | :12:03. | :12:08. | |
even more power to those retail banks. They are the ones who would | :12:08. | :12:12. | |
be saved in the event of a crisis. A quick thought about the sell-off. | :12:12. | :12:16. | |
You think the Government should be selling off parts of the banks that | :12:16. | :12:21. | |
it owns. A bizarre idea, given the struggle to sell off what they have | :12:21. | :12:28. | |
thus far. It is all tied up in better banged competition. One of | :12:28. | :12:32. | |
my colleagues and I have heard from a number of would-be bankers, | :12:32. | :12:36. | |
people who want to set up a bank and have found that there are | :12:36. | :12:40. | |
enormous regulatory hurdles to setting up a bank around things | :12:40. | :12:43. | |
like providing capital Burgess's there uselessly that perhaps they | :12:43. | :12:48. | |
have not got or, indeed, to demonstrate what you would do and | :12:48. | :12:53. | |
then being turned down. -- which sits there used to sleep. The | :12:53. | :12:58. | |
problem is, the FSA and going forward, the regulatory of | :12:58. | :13:02. | |
authority that will regulate banks and future, neither of them has a | :13:02. | :13:06. | |
specific competition objective. Neither has the direct incentive to | :13:06. | :13:12. | |
enable new banks to be established. They have lots of down sides if a | :13:12. | :13:16. | |
bike is established and then fails, they have no incentive to enable | :13:16. | :13:21. | |
them to set up. I think it is all set-up -- tied up with Bank | :13:21. | :13:28. | |
competition. If you can reduce the barriers to entry and divide banks | :13:28. | :13:32. | |
backing to their original retail brands, you could actually create a | :13:32. | :13:42. | |
:13:42. | :13:46. | ||
You have a very fixed idea. You say that you do not want to leave, you | :13:46. | :13:51. | |
want to renegotiate. It is hard to see how you're going to get what | :13:51. | :13:55. | |
you want. A complete negotiation on Britain's terms of his relationship | :13:55. | :14:03. | |
with Europe. I do not think that I am a tricky to the PM. I think that | :14:03. | :14:08. | |
he used in favour of a him? | :14:08. | :14:11. | |
him? On the matter of whether the British people should have a | :14:11. | :14:15. | |
referendum. That was a backbench proposal. I do think that the | :14:16. | :14:22. | |
British people should have their say. That is vital. I had been | :14:22. | :14:25. | |
completely in agreement with the government's approach to | :14:25. | :14:28. | |
renegotiating Britain's relationship within the European | :14:28. | :14:34. | |
Union. The reality is that the entire basis for establishing the | :14:34. | :14:39. | |
EU has changed since the financial crisis. Britain is not responsible | :14:39. | :14:43. | |
for the southern European debts and the crisis that has now ensued. We | :14:43. | :14:49. | |
are not responsible for the problems with the euro. It is in | :14:49. | :14:56. | |
Britain's interests that the euro survives and sort itself out. While | :14:56. | :15:00. | |
they do wish to create a eurozone fiscal union, we would like to be | :15:00. | :15:06. | |
able to give them that. We must also protect British interests. | :15:06. | :15:11. | |
are setting up this idea that while they are going for federalism, we | :15:11. | :15:17. | |
will negotiate our own specific deal for Britain. That is why the | :15:17. | :15:23. | |
Labour MEP said that the reputable point is that the euro reformers, | :15:23. | :15:30. | |
such as you, simply cannot deliver. They need an agreement from all 27 | :15:30. | :15:36. | |
member states. She says that you are confused. She says the work | :15:36. | :15:39. | |
hard but will Labour is nothing more than smoke and mirrors. | :15:40. | :15:45. | |
simply does not have control over the EU in the way that you would | :15:45. | :15:50. | |
like. I think that she is completely wrong. The Lisbon Treaty | :15:50. | :15:54. | |
was the treaty to end all treaties. Yet we're here staring down the | :15:54. | :16:00. | |
barrel of a new treaty to create a eurozone fiscal union at the time | :16:00. | :16:04. | |
of the new treaty. It is entirely expected and required that the | :16:04. | :16:08. | |
British government will come up with its own articulation of what | :16:08. | :16:11. | |
Britain wants in return for establishing that eurozone fiscal | :16:11. | :16:17. | |
union. I too had European ambassadors saying that I am | :16:17. | :16:22. | |
cherry-picking. That is not the case. Look at the scale of what | :16:23. | :16:30. | |
you're suggesting. It is a major overhaul. In fact it is, at the | :16:30. | :16:35. | |
moment I'm working with a group of conservative colleagues to it -- | :16:35. | :16:42. | |
looking for. And number of those renegotiations are things that are | :16:42. | :16:47. | |
already a government policy or ballet are things for which there | :16:47. | :16:51. | |
is a lot of is a lot ofalready. For example, the repatriation of the | :16:51. | :17:00. | |
local element of structural funds. Europe has paid over seven years | :17:00. | :17:05. | |
$33 billion to the euro. Britain received a 9 billion of that back. | :17:05. | :17:11. | |
We had converted 80 euros. It is then being sent back to last. Why | :17:11. | :17:16. | |
not just keep it. You have said you were to look at employment law, | :17:16. | :17:22. | |
farming, fishing, crime, not a structural structural hose | :17:22. | :17:27. | |
areas, we are looking at whether we want to renegotiate. The government | :17:27. | :17:33. | |
has already said that they are looking for an opt-out in the | :17:33. | :17:36. | |
justice and home affairs directives. We are saying that if we do that | :17:36. | :17:41. | |
then we should look at multilateral international agreements in | :17:41. | :17:46. | |
exchange for signing up to EU directives. The problem with such a | :17:46. | :17:50. | |
directive is that it comes under other European Court of Justice for | :17:50. | :17:54. | |
arbitration. Having signed up for something that we like the look of, | :17:54. | :17:58. | |
it then gets amended under qualified voting. We end up with | :17:58. | :18:01. | |
something we do not like. We have the possibility of a treaty and the | :18:01. | :18:06. | |
promise of a referendum with the new treaty. You are saying that we | :18:06. | :18:12. | |
do it these renegotiations of these areas and at some point, quickly, | :18:12. | :18:16. | |
in order to be able to say, let us put this referendum before the | :18:16. | :18:22. | |
British people. These are the terms of the negotiation. T Ward in, out, | :18:22. | :18:26. | |
or middle option? As far as I'm concerned, we will need to | :18:26. | :18:32. | |
articulate a British vision for British relationship within the EU. | :18:32. | :18:36. | |
The EU and not try to push us out. We are the third biggest | :18:36. | :18:42. | |
contributor to the Budget. We are seen as exceedingly helpful. | :18:42. | :18:48. | |
terms of how it would work, it is hard to see the process of how it | :18:48. | :18:51. | |
would work. But you could put something before the British people | :18:51. | :18:55. | |
that would be meaningful. As far as fresh | :18:55. | :19:00. | |
fresh Start project that I founded and leading is not calling for a | :19:00. | :19:04. | |
referendum at the moment. We're talking about trying to articulate | :19:04. | :19:07. | |
a British version of our relationship with the EU that we | :19:07. | :19:13. | |
would be calling on. We would be calling on the Conservative | :19:13. | :19:22. | |
government to call upon the EU... in the way that we wanted to, will | :19:22. | :19:27. | |
we be better off out? Leaving the EU is extraordinarily complicated. | :19:27. | :19:31. | |
It is not a matter of leaving it overnight. There is a negotiation | :19:31. | :19:37. | |
involved. It is not unknown. If we were to leave the EU, if we had a | :19:37. | :19:43. | |
very careful and British interested renegotiation, it would be possible | :19:43. | :19:48. | |
to leave the EU under good terms. Make no mistake, it would be | :19:48. | :19:52. | |
extremely painful for a period of time. You cannot just leave it | :19:52. | :19:57. | |
overnight. Every EU legislation has been enacted into British law. Even | :19:57. | :20:01. | |
if you left it, you have a mass of laws that y laws that yecide to do | :20:01. | :20:08. | |
something with. That would be better than staying in as we are? | :20:08. | :20:13. | |
Exactly as we are, yes. That is why we're doing this work to | :20:13. | :20:17. | |
renegotiating a better term for Britain. There is a spectrum along | :20:17. | :20:24. | |
which it you achieve a percentage of it. Along this line, colleagues | :20:24. | :20:29. | |
will say that on the basis of only achieving 30% of it, I would leave. | :20:29. | :20:34. | |
Others would say that they would stay in on that basis. That is up | :20:34. | :20:38. | |
to the individual. What we must do is renegotiate a better | :20:38. | :20:43. | |
relationship for Britain. We must give it our best shot. We are in | :20:43. | :20:48. | |
one of the most advanced democracies in the world. A year to | :20:48. | :20:57. | |
a rare, a female Conservative MP. There is another well-known | :20:57. | :21:00. | |
Conservative MP who recently gave up on politics because she said | :21:00. | :21:05. | |
that in her situation, it was just too hard to balance the work life | :21:05. | :21:12. | |
with her home life. There were particular circumstances for her. | :21:12. | :21:15. | |
How hard it had he found it? You have children, your active | :21:15. | :21:23. | |
politically. His is difficult? think I am older than her, sadly. I | :21:23. | :21:28. | |
have worked all my life. My children are my priority. If I had | :21:28. | :21:33. | |
to choose, I would drop politics for family. I think that the | :21:33. | :21:39. | |
balance is just right for me. My children have gotten used to it. | :21:39. | :21:43. | |
you think that people find that difficult? They are not used to men | :21:43. | :21:46. | |
saying that. So the idea that you're saying that your children | :21:46. | :21:52. | |
come first. I hope not. I think that I approve every day that I am | :21:52. | :21:56. | |
completely committed to politics. I have wanted to do it since I was 13 | :21:56. | :22:00. | |
years. My children and now at the age that I was when I decided to | :22:00. | :22:07. | |
become an MP. They're in their teens, so you knew very young? | :22:07. | :22:11. | |
they will come into Parliament and they will sit through a debate and | :22:11. | :22:15. | |
they will be proud of their mother. That makes me feel fantastic. They | :22:15. | :22:19. | |
love to see it. They love to see their mother on TV and their mates | :22:19. | :22:25. | |
at school say that I had done this or that. That is embarrassing, but | :22:25. | :22:30. | |
we have the balance right. I am somebody who will be there at the | :22:30. | :22:34. | |
important netball match or rugby match. I will be there at the | :22:34. | :22:40. | |
Christmas concert and that sort of thing. You set up something called | :22:40. | :22:44. | |
the Parent Infant partnership. It is to help mothers who have had | :22:44. | :22:48. | |
post-natal depression. That is the starting point. You experience | :22:48. | :22:54. | |
something like that? Yes, with my first child. Having been capable | :22:54. | :22:59. | |
and doing well in bargaining - -- banking. It was like falling off a | :22:59. | :23:06. | |
cliff. For me, it did not last long. I'm grateful for that. But for many | :23:07. | :23:10. | |
people, not just post-natal depression, but also drug problems | :23:10. | :23:17. | |
or teenage mothers, are certainly post-natal depression that leaves | :23:17. | :23:22. | |
mothers and other family members, fathers and close relatives, you're | :23:22. | :23:27. | |
trying to care for a baby and simply cannot. The key point in | :23:27. | :23:31. | |
setting this up is that a baby who does not have a sympathetic, | :23:31. | :23:35. | |
empathetic Caraher, suffers in terms of their own brain | :23:35. | :23:44. | |
development. Between the aid of a zero and two, an infant's brain | :23:44. | :23:48. | |
does in certain directions because of neural connections made in the | :23:48. | :23:53. | |
early life. A baby literally learn some earliest experiences how its | :23:53. | :23:58. | |
will haul lifelong emotional health will shape up. It is critical that | :23:58. | :24:02. |