Lord Hawkeasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they are satisfied that the capital base of the clearing banks is wide enough to sustain, in addition to their normal business, a large incursion into the mortgage market involving borrowing short and lending long.
§ Lord CockfieldThe prudential supervision of the clearing banks is the responsibility of the Bank of England under the Banking Act 1979. Under that Act, the Bank is required to be satisfied that each institution maintains net assets, together with other financial resources, appropriate to the scale of the institution's operations. As part of this prudential assessment the Bank takes into account the mortgage lending operations of the banks as well as their other lending operations.