Labour will “unashamedly champion” the UK’s financial-services sector after winning the general election.
The party outlined its aims and priorities including reducing the sector’s regulatory burden in a 24-page document published earlier this year.
Among the proposals are streamlining the Financial Conduct Authority’s 10,000-page regulatory handbook.
Labour MP Rachel Reeves, who held her seat and is expected to become the UK’s first female chancellor, said it was not about watering down protection for consumers, but “to have a proper review to make sure that the rules and regulations we’ve got are fit for purpose”.
Labour also plans to “simplify the ISA landscape to make it as easy as possible for people to feel the benefits of saving and investing their money”.
It has promised a review of the pensions landscape and given its backing to the FCA’s review of the advice-guidance boundary.
In addition, Labour is planning to create a ‘Regulatory Innovation Office’ that could help regulators share data.
Reeves has also ruled out a windfall tax on bank profits.
She said: “We will unashamedly champion our financial-services sector as one of the UK’s greatest assets.”
Labour’s top six priorities for financial services are as follows:
1. Deliver inclusive growth of the UK’s financial services sector by scalling regional financial centres alongside established hubs in London and Edinburgh and unlocking the full potential of the mutuals sector.
2. Enhance the international competitiveness of the UK’s financial services sector by pursuing a more joined up and innovation-centred approach to regulation and supervision, streamlining the regulatory rulebook in line with the Consumer Duty, strengthening international engagement in financial services, and building a more collaborative relationship with the EU.
3. Reinforce consumer protection and financial inclusion by exploring alternative models for increasing financial resilience including longer-term fixed rate mortgages, adopting a coordinated cross-sectoral approach to fraud prevention, creating a national financial inclusion strategy, and regulating the Buy Now Pay Later sector.
4. Lead the world in sustainable finance by making the UK a global hub for green finance activity, delivering a world-leading green finance regulatory framework, and partnering with the financial services sector to support the decarbonisation of homes.
5. Embrace innovation and fintech as the future of financial services by becoming a global standard-setter for the use of AI in FS, delivering the next phase of Open Banking, defining a roadmap for Open Finance, embracing securities tokenisation and a central bank digital currency, and establishing a regulatory sandbox for financial products to reach underserved communities.
6. Reinvigorate capital markets by reviewing the pensions and retirement savings landscape, enabling greater consolidation of all types of schemes, empowering the British Business Bank to invest more in growth capital, establishing a British ‘Tibi’ scheme to increase institutional investment in venture capital and small cap growth equity, and increasing investment in infrastructure and green industries through Solvency UK reforms.
Reeves added: “A strong financial services sector isn’t just an engine for growth. It helps Britons reach their financial goals, save for their future, and support their families.
“We will champion financial inclusion to ensure all people have access to affordable products and services to support their financial wellbeing.
“We believe a strong financial services sector will drive investment in jobs and new industries.
“Our financial sector can be a vehicle for growth not just from the top down,
but from the bottom up and the middle out.”
The FCA won’t like this at all. It might even mean that a few people at Stratford get held meaningfully to account when they screw up and/or fail to fulfil their regulatory responsibilities. Nail ’em to a cross and hang ’em high for a week I say.