Commenting on the sale of Lloyd’s shares, Lawrence Tomlinson, Entrepreneur in Residence at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills said:
“The Government is clearly testing the water with this initial sale of shares, I just hope it is not premature. We are still lacking competition in the banking sector which has led to consistently poor levels of lending to business. We have seen some economic recovery in the last couple of quarters but it is very early days. We are still a long way off real recovery and we need the banks to support this. Without access to finance businesses simply cannot grow, exports decline and we become ever more reliant on the very financial sector that caused this recession in the first place.”
“UKFI has confirmed that no further shares will be sold for at least 90 days so the Treasury are showing some caution. The Government still has time to put on the brakes so there is an imperative for Lloyds to ensure they are supporting growth and lending to businesses. I cannot see any reason to rush into the selling of Lloyd’s shares – I think we all regret Gordon Brown selling our gold far too cheaply.”