Let Nationwide members vote on Virgin Money bid, says Tory peer Baroness Altmann

Nationwide members should be given the chance to vote on its planned takeover of Virgin Money, a Conservative peer has said.

Baroness Altmann, the former pensions minister, said it “would be prudent” for the building society to consult its more than 14 million members about the £3bn deal which shocked the city when it was announced last week.

The deal would create Britain’s second-largest savings and loan group and catapult Nationwide into the upper echelons of retail banking with £366bn in assets and almost 700 branches.

But Altmann said getting members to approve the deal was “important.” She said: ‘It would be prudent for Nationwide members to have a say in the acquisition of Virgin Money.

“The beauty of a mutual is that it is run in the interests of its members, who also have the right to vote, and giving them the opportunity to exercise their right in a major transaction seems sensible.”

A member of a major shareholder advisory group, who asked not to be identified, said they “didn’t understand why there shouldn’t be a member vote” on the deal.

On Sunday, financial services expert and fellow Liberal Democrat Baroness Bowles said the deal looked good on paper but members would need to be consulted as it would mean Nationwide was “jumping into the league of the big boys.” banks”.

But Nationwide’s management, led by chief executive Debbie Crosbie, has argued that any vote would “tie the board’s hands” and restrict its ability to buy a listed bank.

He said the combined group would “bring the benefits of fairer, mutually owned banking to more people in the UK”. The building society is expected to write to its members about the deal within weeks.