So Lord Turner’s report on the collapse of RBS indicates quite clearly that the FSA was deficient in its regulation of the banks. What a surprise there! Any journalist, accountant, lawyer or investment banker will tell you that this is news for no one.
Ever since it came into being the Financial Services Authority, and indeed the Financial Services Act have proved to be a huge bureaucratic constraint on business. Instead of really getting to grips with and concerning themselves with regulating the things that matter in our economy, the bureaucrats at the FSA concentrated on bringing in regulation (have a read of the Financial Services Act – I am not sure what language it is in but it certainly is not English!) which served to put many smaller financial advisers out of business. Meanwhile, the banks ran riot. Turner blamed light-handed regulation for a lot of our economic woes. But in truth it is more a case of – as usual in this country - well-meaning but misguided legislation which uses a sledgehammer to crack a nut and which hits the easy target – the smaller business- whilst not really addressing the important issues.
Filed under: Banks Tagged: | economic woes, financial advisers, financial services act, Lord Turner, RBS
