NatWest to move headquarters if Scotland votes for independence

NatWest will move its headquarters out of Scotland just after 294 years if the state will become unbiased, chief govt Alison Rose has said.

Ms Rose said the bailed-out bank would be compelled to act simply because it is basically way too major for the Scottish financial system to help. The financial institution – which last calendar year modified its name from Royal Financial institution of Scotland – holds all around £770bn of property, nearly 5 occasions Scotland’s GDP.

In her to start with substantive remarks on the likely break-up of the Union since taking charge of the bank in 2019, Ms Rose said: “In the function that there was independence for Scotland our equilibrium sheet would be way too major for an unbiased Scottish financial system.

“And so we would move our registered headquarters, in the function of independence, to London.”

The warning arrives days in advance of Scots go to the polls to elect a new devolved government, with the SNP seeking a mandate for a next independence referendum. 

Ms Rose added: “We are neutral on the situation of Scottish independence. It’s a little something for the Scottish men and women to make a decision.”

NatWest employs additional than 10,000 men and women north of the border, with the greater part centered in its sprawling Gogarburn headquarters on the outskirts of Edinburgh, which is set in one hundred acres of woodland on the site of a previous psychiatric establishment.

It also lends additional than £5m a working day to Scottish households and businesses. 

A NatWest spokesman said any improve in the bank’s registered headquarters would have no implications on its offices, employees or customers.

The bank’s previous management said in advance of the 2014 Scottish independence referendum that a yes vote would pressure them to move its head office to London. Having said that, Ms Rose has said minor on the situation right until now.

The move will also increase concerns about rival Lloyds Banking Team, which has been registered in Scotland because its merger with HBOS in 2009. A supply at the bank said is was too early to speculate about any improve. 

Scottish Conservative finance spokesman Murdo Fraser said RBS’s warning “starkly confirms the quite actual effects for Scottish jobs and business if Nicola Sturgeon at any time gets her way”.