Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps he has taken to monitor practices in the banking sector.

This Government has taken a number of major steps to strengthen monitoring and regulation of the banking sector.

The Financial Services Act 2012 put in place two new, properly focussed financial regulators, the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) - a subsidiary of the Bank of England - the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), as part of a new approach to financial regulation. The new regulators started work on 1 April 2013.

The Government’s new approach to financial regulation enables the PRA to concentrate on monitoring the health of UK banks to ensure that they are prudently and competently managed and to reduce the risk that the practices of UK banks will lead to serious financial failure. At the same time, the FCA can concentrate on monitoring the practices of UK banks and other financial services businesses in their dealing with ordinary retail customers and in wholesale financial markets, to reduce the risk that the practices in the banking sector are detrimental to consumers or competition, or threaten the integrity of financial markets.

On 12 June 2014, the Government announced the Fair and Effective Markets Review, which is a joint review by HM Treasury, the Bank of England, and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) into the way wholesale financial markets operate. The Government is determined to take action to help restore trust and integrity and to ensure that the highest standards are expected of those who operate in these markets. It is important that this is done in a way that preserves the UK’s position as the global financial centre for many of these markets. The Review published its consultation document “How fair and effective are the fixed income, foreign exchange and commodities markets?” on 27 October, and the Government looks forward to the review’s final recommendations in June 2015.