Publicly owned shares in the Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds are still £34billion below the the cost of financing the purchases – more than half the initial outlay.

National Audit Office (NAO) figures in a progress report on the Treasury's bail-outs of the banks reveal that the outstanding taxpayer support for Britain's banking industry is £141m.

The money watchdog pointed out that to remove the support to these banks, the loans would need to be repaid, the guarantees withdrawn, and the shares returned to private ownership.

As at March 2013, the outstanding taxpayer support stood at £141bn, which is down from the total a year ago of £242bn and from the peak of £1.2tr.

In return for providing the support, the Treasury has charged fees for the financial guarantee schemes and received interest on the loans. Its current forecasts say the majority of its outstanding loans to failed financial institutions will be repaid over the next decade.

The NAO noted that the "income provided by fees and interest is less than would be expected from a normal market investment and has not compensated the taxpayer for the degree of risk accepted by taxpayers in providing the support".

It went on: "Once the opportunity cost and risks are factored in, the schemes have represented a transfer of at least £5bn from taxpayers to the financial sector since 2008."

On RBS and Lloyds, the Treasury invested £66.3bn in shares to make sure the banks had capital to survive.

The NAO said that the market value at March 31, 2013, of the shares was £28bn below the original investment, ie, £38bn and more than £34bn below the proceeds that "would need to be realised to reflect the cost of financing the purchases of the shares in 2008 and 2009", ie, £32bn.

It stressed that the eventual returns for the taxpayer from the disposals of the UK Government's shareholdings in both banks would depend on how well their business plans were developed and delivered as well as the performance of the economy.