Del Missier: Diamond did tell me to fix Libor rate

Barclay's executive Jerry del Missier, 50, gives evidence that seems to contradict his former boss (AP)

The Barclays executive at the centre of the Libor interest rate-fixing scandal last night said he had only passed on "instructions" from a conversation he had with his then boss Bob Diamond.

In potentially explosive testimony to the Treasury Select Committee, Jerry del Missier, right, who quit last week as chief operating officer along with the Barclays chief executive Mr Diamond, said: "He (Mr Diamond) said he had had a conversation with Mr (Paul) Tucker at the Bank of England. (He said) the Bank of England was getting pressure from Whitehall about the health of Barclays and that we should get our Libor rates down. That we shouldn't be outliers."

The 50-year-old Canadian's testimony appears to contradict Mr Diamond, who told MPs there was no instruction from the Bank and that he did not intend to relay one.

Mr del Missier said: "I passed the instruction as I had received it on to the money markets desk. I relayed the contents of the conversation I had had with Mr Diamond and expected the Bank of England's views would be incorporated into Libor submissions."

Challenged on the point he said: "It was an instruction, yes."