The UK Government, which has been pushing shareholders to engage more actively in the the companies they own, benefited from fund managers pushing for a higher price on the sale of British Energy to EDF, an influential report has found.

The report by the National Audit Office, the body set up to assess the value for money of UK Government policies, has backed fund managers who pushed for a higher price in the deal, finding that the government did not take into account the strategic value to EDF of the deal.