There has to be more to this than is currently in the public domain. It is obvious the club was having financial problems otherwise there would have been no need to do the lease deal with the RFL or seek an increase in an already large bank overdraft. If a company cannot pay all its bills within a reasonable timescale then it is insolvent. If tax bills were overdue with insufficient income then perhaps the bank knew winding up petitions were inevitable.

If this were the case and the company business plan was not credible for these difficult economic times then though regretable the bank would have no option but to protect its shareholders (in this case the tax payers) by calling in/reducing the overdraft facility.

What needs to be made clear is that if the company had funds to reduce the overdraft (and so reduce the directors personal liabilities) then why had they not already paid the outstanding tax bills? Funny smell?

NatWest is staying as part of RBS, effectively the face of RBS in England and Wales.Its the RBS branches themsleves which have been sold to Santander as a sanction by the EU on the bailed out bank to sell a profitable arm of its business to create more competition. Whilst it may look on paper that by Santnder buying the 314 branches isnt creating competition, in fact it is as Santander have a small Private banking and Commercial / coorprate banking market share. The purchse of the branch network and the customers that are with it means they become a major player. They are agressively trying to grow Commercial banking, something the new owners (if it happens) at the Bulls should note if the decide to rebank elsewhere.

In terms of jobs, the TUPE regulation means there cannot be any job cuts for the first 2 years. After that, who knows

Also, a tad out of context labelling them a spanish bank. Yes, the roots come from Spain , but in the same was as HSBC is Hong Kong. Santander are a global player with a lot of their income coming from South America. Santander UK is exactly that, it is ring fenced, by law as a UK entity and cannot be used to bail out any other country in monetary terms. Effectively it is very much a stand alone UK bank.

Adding to the above: TUPE does not prevent job cuts, sadly. It preserves the rights of employees when businesses are transferred.

Santander UK is, as TB says, essentially an UK entity owned by Santander of Spain. It is the sum of Abbey National, Alliance & Leicester and Bradford & Bingley retail operations. If the parent fell over, though, the subsidiary would not be secure.

Not really comparable with HSBC, since the Hong Kong & Shanghai Banking Corporation moved its domicile to the UK from HK when it took over Midland bank a couple of decades ago.

Santander UK was considering an IPO of part of its operations, but canned it because of the economic climate. At some stage, though, I would still expect them to look at having at least part of the equity in the hands of third-party shareholders. They certainly want to become a major fifth commercial force in the UK. Whether that means they will have any appetite for lending to "riskier" organisations is open to question, I suspect. My own view is that they would likely look to concentrate on quality lending - as would all the banks.

Yep, you put it much clearer than me Adey!!
And yes, quality lending has to be hoped for, along with common sense approaches to applications!!!!

In the end though lending carries a degree of risk and risk is an unknown, you can calculate it, hedge it, take insurance on it and try to account for it, but it's still a risk and so its something no one can control.

I just find it frustrating when people say x or y will not lend, or are reducing their lending, as though lending is right everyone is born with. I'm currently asking for a loan, but it does not mean I automatically expect to get it no matter how safe a bet I may seam. I also have an overdraft, again I'm aware that it's not actually my money and the bank can remove or reduce it at any point.

If a business is living off an overdraft, which many do even if that business is profitable and successful, it does not given them any additional right to expect such a facility to continue forever and a day. In the end it's someone else's money.