Five banks that lent £140m of emergency cash to Carillion in September have been accused of "irresponsible lending" by an MP investigating the firm's collapse, after they made it a condition that none of the money go to the firm's deficit-hit pension schemes.

MPs on the joint committee looking into the firm's collapse were told at the weekend, by pension scheme chairman Robin Ellison, that the five lenders — Barclays, Lloyds, HSBC, Royal Bank of Scotland and Santander — had asked Carillion to suspend payments to its schemes in September.