Government ignores competition law in push for HBOS-Lloyds merger
Updated on 17 September 2008
Gordon Brown sanctions Lloyds TSB takeover of HBOS in the country's 'wider financial interest'.
The crisis engulfing Britain's biggest mortgage lender has come to an explosive head, as HBOS shares collapsed another 19 per cent.
The deal, though it will change the face of high street banking, is deemed so urgent in the wider financial interest of the country that the government is suspending the competition law to allow it to go through without scrutiny.
This is despite Lloyds' attempts to takeover Abbey seven years ago being prohibited by ministers, because it was deemed not to be in the public interest.
