Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what discussions he has had with the financial industry on the state of the financial services sector's IT systems.

Responsibility for information technology infrastructure in the UK financial sector is primarily for the firms themselves. However, the Financial Authorities have a role to play in supervising, coordinating and driving change to improve the operational resilience of the sector.

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) jointly launched, in October 2014, a review of firms’ critical infrastructure and technology resilience. The review focuses on the most significant UK retail deposit-taking organisations and is expected to conclude later this summer. The results will not be published but the FCA and PRA will provide feedback to the firms individually on their findings and any follow-up actions.

The risk of a bank experiencing severe and prolonged technical problems affecting its core infrastructure is included as an example of technical failure in the 2015 edition of the National Risk Register of Civil Emergencies published by the Cabinet Office and available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-risk-register-for-civil-emergencies-2015-edition.