Financial Services Bill

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Newby, for asking me that question. Financial regulation should be harmonised and co-ordinated on a global level, not a European level. Financial markets are definitely global. They are not national and they are not European. Within the European Union there is only one major wholesale financial market and that is London. Of course, every country has its own retail market, so every country needs its own body to supervise its retail financial market. As far as wholesale financial markets are concerned, London is the only market. London is also the principal global financial market, or one of them. Our regulator, be it the Bank of England or the FSA, should be able to sit at the table with the American SEC, Japan’s FSA and other principal financial regulators around the world to co-ordinate regulatory policy. To attempt to do so at a European level is unnecessary and potentially destructive to London’s competitiveness.