FCA blasted for making one regulatory change after another

After the FCA’s Peter Ewing presented on the New Senior Managers’ and Certification Regime - the latest change coming to market - mortgage broker Michelle Lawson, director of Lawson Financial, objected at the Q&A session.

FCA blasted for making one regulatory change after another

The FCA was blasted for making too many regulatory changes at the Financial Services Expo London today.

The regulator has been busy introducing a raft of regulation in the past few years, including the Mortgage Market Review in 2014 and the Mortgage Credit Directive in 2016.

After the FCA’s Peter Ewing presented on the New Senior Managers’ and Certification Regime - the latest change coming to market - mortgage broker Michelle Lawson, director of Lawson Financial, objected at the Q&A session.

She said: “There seems to be so, so many changes going on at the moment.

“We’ve had the buy-to-let people talking about the tax changes, the PRA changes, we’ve now got the [SMS] regulatory changes.

“It just seems endless right now and it feels quite swamping as a business owner and as a mortgage adviser trying to keep on top of everything.

“I want to know when it’s going to end.

"When we are going to leave it and let it settle for a minute, to give us a chance to regroup and do our job without having to read through endless consultation papers?”

Ewing, who is technical specialist at the FCA, said: “Thankyou. I do very much sympathise with that.

“A lot of my colleagues back at Canary Wharf would probably sympathise with that as well.

"In other sectors it’s very much true as well. We’ve got MiFID II coming in for other firms as well and other challenges.

“There is a lot of sympathy for that - i don’t think i can give you a proper answer to that and i do take your point.

“It’s a lot for us as well!"

Robert Sinclair, chief executive of Association of Mortgage Intermediaries, said: “I think in Peter’s defense this is something that’s been forced on them by government.