Jobs in the balance as bank deal collapses
Sunday 14 October 2012
Printable
EmailEU meddling has resulted in chaotic uncertainty over the future of hundreds of bank branches and centres putting a question mark over thousands of jobs.
Unions criticised the European Commission today after it ordered the sale of 316 branches and 40 banking centres of Royal Bank of Scotland as a requirement for its £45 billion rescue by the British government during the financial crisis.
They were due to be sold to Spanish bank Santander but the agreement collapsed on Friday because it said the deal was taking too long - now Sir Richard Branson's (pictured) Virgin Money is strongly rumoured to be involved.
Virgin Money has apparently had "informal" contacts with RBS - keen to rebid after it originally lost out to Santander when the network first came up for grabs in 2010.
Unite's assistant general secretary Gail Cartmail urged the government to press the European Commission to drop its insistence that the branches should be sold in the £1.65bn deal.
Ms Cartmail said that she was worried there would be a "fire sale."
She said: "This latest development is causing yet more uncertainty and represents another day of chaos for loyal RBS staff."
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