“Lloyds TSB was a cautious bank, mocked for its conservatism by the banking buccaneers whose testosterone-charged aggression precipitated the downfall of the British financial sector. It was precisely the kind of healthy institution that, left alone, could have led the national recovery. But Gordon Brown, with the anti-Midas touch that characterises him, pushed it into a doomed union with HBOS, thus destroying a bank that gave capitalism credibility.”

Gerald Warner