The latest from Not The FSA

Latest updates: 17 March

Although nothing has actually changed, the fight for accountability within the FSA made its voice known yesterday. During the first day's committee debate on the Financial Services and Markets Bill, which will set up the FSA, several Lords spoke on amendments along the lines of our ten suggestions.

All of these amendments were then withdrawn which is part of the Opposition's usual strategy in the Lords. The amendments are put forward so that a point can be made and, depending on the mood of the debate, the amendments may be reintroduced (with the intention of passing them) when the Bill reaches its report stage.

Lord Jenkin summed up the mood of many peers by pointing out that "the FSA will be the most powerful insititution created in peacetimes Britain. It is in many respects legislator, investigator, prosecutor, judge, jury and executioner."

Some of the proposed amendments under debate included:

# Splitting the role of Chairman and Chief Executive. (As Lord Saatchi put it, "reasonable people are mystified as to why the rules of governance that they are expected to apply to their clients should not be applied to the body which regulates them.)

# Requiring the appointment Chairman, Chief Executive or Deputy Chief Executive to be scrutinised by Parliament.

# Letting complaints against the FSA go straight to an independent investigator, rather than being 'filtered' by the FSA.

# Requiring specific information in the FSA's annual report, including the reasons why they have rejected any advice from the consumer or practicioner panels. (In the words of Lord Newby, when the panels make proposals, the case should be that "everybody can see when the authority does not follow them, rather than the panels submit proposals which simply disappear into a black hole.")

# Removing the FSA's statutory immunity when they have acted recklessly.

The Bill will continue through the committe stage on Tuesday and Wednesday, and will later go to report stage where opposition peers are expected to press for proposals such as these to become reality.

16 March

Perhaps the last chance to secure accountability is about to begin. The Financial Services and Markets Bill begins its committee stage in the Lords today, with further debate next Monday and Tuesday. At the moment, no amendments have been tabled to secure greater accountability, but we live in hope. Keep checking back here for updates from Parliament.

Due to popular request we now have a page suggesting what you can do to fight for accountability.

Patience Wheatcroft, a writer in The Times, had a great piece today that may well be the most critical view of the FSA's accountability yet published. You can read it here.

Howard Davies appeared before the House of Commons Treasury select committee this week to answer questions. We'll bring you the highlights as soon as we have them.

A survey published by the FSA's own practicioner panel shows that just 18% of small businesses believe there are sufficient safeguards to make sure the FSA is accountable.

One insurance worker who visits our site regularly has contacted us to say that his firm's network has barred access to notthefsa.co.uk - how odd!

(Old updates)

It's been a busy first couple of weeks at this site, thanks in particular to our star appearance in the Times City Diary. And though most of the feedback has been positive, it seems the FSA board were mainly upset with their addresses being made public - which does beg the question of why they became company directors. Anyway, we've been deciding what to do next.

We had thought, looking at our high class of visitors, of going into the banner advert business - but we decided you'd all prefer us to stick to the info. And rumours that we will be the latest 'dot-com' business to go public are false - after all, we don't want to give the FSA the chance to regulate our stock market listing.

Instead, we've decided to produce a list of suggestions as to how the FSA could be more accountable. You can find them by clicking here. If this country really does still have democracy and justice, these will be taken on board by the House of Lords as it continues debating the Financial Services and Markets Bill.

We've also added some quotes from the Lords debates to our quotes page.

Keep checking back here as we will be regularly updating the site. We're planning more information on what you can do to join the fight for accountability. And do feel free to drop us a line at [email protected]