King: Barclays sailed close to the wind too often

Sir Mervyn King has told the Treasury select committee Barclays had sailed close to the wind too often.

Explaining why he had intervened with FSA Chairman Lord Turner to put pressure on the board as the Libor scandal emerged, Sir Mervyn told MPs he had hoped to persuade senior management to take decisive action over the crisis.

The governor of the Bank of England said the bank's board had seemed in a state of denial when the scandal first emerged and had hoped to "rough it out" before pressure had been increased by financial authorities.