Ring fence on Tweed?
STANDS Scotland where it did? Here is its biggest brewery, the biggest employer among its manufacturing companies, and just about the oldest chestnut among shares rumoured for takeovers, finally getting a bid — from the other end of the world — and Scotland's biggest bank helps to finance the bid.... The Royal Bank of Scotland doesn't see it like that. Never, it says, would it lend to a non-customer to bid for a customer, but this time both are on its books, and it must not take sides, and such loans are commercial decisions by management and not policy decisions by the board. If there is to be a bid-proof ring fence round Scotland, then someone else must put it there. I reflect, though, that if the Monopolies Commission had not on the flimsiest foundation put up such a ring fence round the Royal Bank, it would not be there lending today. It would have been swallowed by Standard Chartered or Hongkong & Shanghai or even Lloyds Bank, which never publicly declared an appetite but was eyeing it greedily at the time. The Commission memorably said that loss of independence would diminish the career opportunities for Scottish bank- ers. Like a plan for keeping elephants away, this seems to have worked. The bank's chieftains explain that by doing good banking business they keep the opportunities going.
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