Government avoids defeat on banking bill

Today’s Treasury questions was a pretty tame affair. Labour produced a pretty mild set of questions on tax avoidance and solar energy, while Tory eurosceptics only caused trouble in the opening questions by complaining about the Treasury’s analysis of the economic consequences of Brexit – and at the very end when Sir Edward Leigh and Stewart Jackson challenged the Chancellor again on the matter. But there wasn’t much heat in either line of inquiry.

What was more interesting was the way George Osborne managed to avoid a growing rebellion on the Bank of England and Financial Services Bill when he took a topical question from Tory MP Charles Walker. Walker has an amendment to that piece of legislation, which had its report stage in the Commons this afternoon, on the action banks take against suspected money laundering, in particular the way they treat ‘politically exposed persons’. This action has affected a number of MPs and their families.

Walker’s amendment already had strong support on the Order Paper but I understand that 21 Tory MPs had pledged their support, which meant that Osborne had no choice but to accept it.