Should you support fight against FSCS? | Opinion | Money Marketing

Should you support fight against FSCS? | Opinion | Money Marketing


Mike Fenwick | 9 Jul 2010 9:08 am

I would like to add 3 separate comments to this thread, which I hope may assist.

Quote: "The fund would need to be transparent and every penny spent would need to be accounted for, preferably to an independent set of trustees."

1: The sums involved in aggregate, and any latent risk that more might be needed do imho call for exactly the form of audit and supervision that Nic is suggesting. I mean no disrespect to Gareth Fatchett, indeed I believe RL's interests are best served by agreeing to adopt just such a proposal. In large part it was it was the lack of such a system that led to the Keydata affair, and it would be a supreme irony imho if lessons were not learned.

2: As is recorded on other threads in this paper, I made a detailed submission to the FSCS before their eventual decision was made, and both the FSCS and the FSA are aware that I intend to prepare a further report on the lessons to be learned. In more recent e-mails shared with Evan Owen, Chris Cummings, Alan Lakey, and Paul McMillan, Gareth Fatchett has been made aware that my involvement may assist in the JR, and may address aspects not yet raised by him. Clearly, whether that is to be the case depends on whether sufficient funds are raised to allow the JR to proceed, but I am happy to place on record that I will assist, if the JR proceeds, and if Gareth eventually deems any contribution from me worthy of inclusion.

3: I placed the "ifs" in the latter part of the above comment, because I believe there is an equally important, if not more important, aspect that needs to be addressed - namely should those affected by the decisions of the FSCS and the FSA be left to wait until they decide when it is time to review the whole system, and then be dependent in any consultation on the terms of reference chosen solely by the FSA?

And by that I do not just mean those who pay any levies, I include as the major priority the ultimate consumer and the taxpayer, for whom the past few years have provided more than sufficient evidence, imho, that the current system devised by the FSA does not do what it says on the tin.

Perhaps, given the costs imposed on each and everyone of us, costs engendered by a failed system of regulatory control, it is time to look for radically different ways to protect the consumer, and the taxpayer?

Perhaps, when you think about it, that is, in the ultimate, the role of independent financial advice?