RBS report: 'flawed' FSA contributed to bank's failure

Come on let us know who at the FSA has lost their job, what fine they have had and will it be published on the FSAs web page….

Oh dear Hector time to fall on your sword!

@Nick.

It was Hector? now how do replace a £ 800k salary

And Equitable ....asleep on the job..... too many rules not enough responsibility, clearly you cannot legislate people into behaving ethically.. why did the CEO of RBS keep his golden parachute... why did the MP's AVC escape the Equitable MVA just prior to Equitable going bust...why did Gaines Cooper keep to the IR20 guild yet lose the case....why do MP's have tax exempt pay that mean they have an effective salary of £130K when the rest of us have kitchens as a P11D charge... How come Blair is so wealthy....Re reading Animal Farm to try to understand, time to fly south for the winter

l'ifa passeport en provenance de France

Désolé je ne comprends pas?

Salaire Hectors, ce qu'il va faire quand il a atterri sur son épée

l'ifa passeport en provenance de France

do I care? No! The man has destroyed my very successful business, I despise him!

Is this some form of regulatory Cluedo?

Lord Adair Turner, recently described by Kelvin McKenzie as “he of the ten-dollar haircut and the ten cent brain” arrives at the TSC telling them that making a regulator accountable would place a financial burden on the industry. By applying this logic for some reason I note he conveniently ignores the cost impact of badly formed, executed or reasoned regulation on the industry.

Additionally he sees that by making those who regulate accountable for their mistakes would mean that they would be constrained in the judgments they may make.

Surely that is what responsibility in office is all about, getting it right and facing the consequences of getting it wrong. If there is no risk to getting it wrong there is no balance in the judgment. It was Joseph Addison, an English essayist, poet and politician who said, “if you give a man the power of doing what he pleases with impunity, you extinguish his fear, and consequently overturn in him one of the great pillars of morality”

Turner said “The FSA as an institution has no money and no shareholders. Any suits against it which result in payments to particular groups would mean another group of people in the industry would have a levy placed upon them to pay for it. We have talked about the need to get away from box ticking and giving the regulators the ability to make more judgments. But the more individuals are subject to legal sanctions the more the automatic response of a cautious individual will be just to stick to the box-ticking approach.”

Why is it that those in an unelected position of power and authority fail to see that an element of responsibility should attach to that power? As Shaw observed, “those who have once been intoxicated with power, and have derived any kind of emolument from it, even though but for one year, can never willingly abandon it”

Life is a series of checks and balances, without these society is lost. What we are talking about here is actually morality. If you as a firm get it wrong there is a price to pay, nowadays the Consumer rightly expects it, so why should they not expect it from those who are charged with overseeing their “protection” when they get it wrong?

In an institution that has money and shareholders, and especially a regulated one, a price is paid and often a very high one for getting it wrong. For those without means today the price is still paid by giving something back to the community.

Not the banks it would appear or those responsible at the FSA who focussed on conduct and not prudential.

A case of the FSA not being able to walk straight and chew gum at the same time then means nobody is sanctioned!

@ Arthur

collective consciousness.. eh?

@Nick

he is a bit smug!

Due diligence "light".

Only cost £50 billion or so, wrecked peoples lives, lost peoples life time savings and put millions out of work - but FSA say all to complicated for us we could find no one accountable certainly we were not reckless.

But in Quangoland rule 1 must be applied -never miss an opportunity to grab more power and aquire bigger budgets.

So an open and honest regulator tried to bury this report because it was self-critical (a wonder in itself) and only the TSC managed to get it out in the open.

Why then are we getting all the same people morphed into the FCA to carry on being devious and unaccountable?

@ile de France from me of Bridgend

Can we have it in English. I struggle with my own language let alone French - merci

This is why l was so angry about the Transact fine last week. Transact were only guilty of being a standing target. The FSA is a can of worms, and whilst they are all wriggling around in their Tower shaped can, away from personal blame, it is impossible to nail the worm who is respnsible for a far bigger crime than Transact were ever guilty of.

CEO of a failed IFA hung out to dry, fined and banned for regulatory failures eve though only in office for a couple of years. RBS CEO - no action - absolute joke!

"Significant Weakness in Capital Position" a clear breach of one of the FSA core principles but still no action taken.

Now where is that IFA who failed to tick box 973 when advising on an ISA - got to nail the miscreant!

Listening to Lord Turner on Radio 4 this morning, he created the usual excuses for nobody losing their jobs etc at the FSA. However it does beggar belief that Hector's promotion to Deputy Gov of the B of E will still go ahead.

Typical of the public sector though no one falls on their sword. Look at the mistakes made by the HMRC over the last two years. The top man still leaves with all his pension rights intact and probably a gong in the New Years Honours List.

Michael Fallon of the TSC got his teeth stuck in and if they have any sense the TSC will now look at the FSA soon to be the FCA and get it sorted.

Mr Turner (why was he made a Lord?) was on Radio 4 this morning. He said that it wasn't Hector's fault and that he backs Hector for being promoted.

The problem was that the journalist conducting the interview, although reasonably well briefed, clearly did not understand the implications of it all.

Folks.... MF Global should bring Hector down, oh and us lot !

Fundamentally, this should be considered one of the most major political failings of all time where Gordon Brown was the architect and custodian of a regulator that has not done its duty. Indeed, current incumbents of the opposition were participators too, namely Ed Balls.

We have enough problems and I dread to think where we’d be if they were still in office. Their constant argument is that it wasn’t us, it was the Banks. That we’ve all known but the evidence now confirms what we’ve also all known in that the Government of the day did not know what it was doing by creating a regulatory monster that couldn’t cope.

Gordon Brown’s constant statement prior to and once he became Chancellor was that he was going to end the Boom and Bust. What resulted was the most enormous and Boom and most monumental Bust in history.

Happy Christmas Mr Brown.

Turner recommends new rules which would automatically ban senior executives and directors of failed banks from future positions of responsibility and a pay could be deferred /forfeited in the event of failure.

Why not apply this obvious rule to include failed regulator executives.

As the FSA has always fully supported back dating with hindsight ,this would seem a very logical step to take.

@Chris F - re BBC interview Turner only appears after the questions have been agreed in advance.

The interviewer certainly understands his job depends on it.

What about the rest?

Why don't the FSA also launch an enquiry into their mishandling of Keydata and the life settlements market in general instead of backing the FSCS to sue IFAs for alleged mis-selling of these products? FSA get your house in order and be fair on all fronts not just what suits best.

Give my comments to night .To busy today working for the FSA GABRIEL returns

The only surprises in the report are that

1 - IFA's were not blamed for not spotting the problems within the banks.

2 - The FSA are not trying to put the cost of the £45.5 billion taxpayer bailout of RBS which currently shows a £25 billion loss to taxpayers onto the FSCS levy (advisers only), and the FSCS to launch a mis advise claim against any IFA who allowed a client to leave a deposit with RBS.

The above actions after all are exactly what the FSa are trying to do in Keydata and CF Arch Cru.

@ Lee Conway: Gordon Brown said he'd put an end to TORY boom and bust. Of course, the New Labour boom and bust he brought in to replace it was far batter...

@ James Clancy. Interestingly I normally do my Gabriel return on a weekend but on starting it on Wednesday I noticed the FSA Gabriel Return website was closed for two days to do updates etc. Phoned the FSA to see if I could be given a two day extension have only just realised it was closed. Reasonable course of action you would think.

No they turned me down flat and could no guarantee that I would not be fined for a late return. Always done it on time, never missed paying my fees but they would not give me a two day extension although it was not my fault the website was closed for updates. That is the type of regulator we are dealing with - joke!

Power without accountability ~ what a vile cocktail for those who have to suffer under the yoke of such tyranny. Meanwhile, Adair Turner continues to demand ever more power and ever more, more, MORE money, despite the fact that the FSA has shown itself manifestly incapable of handling competently all the power and money it already has. Quite the contrary, in fact. A leviathan at large barely begins to describe such a monster.

@James/Bob

I've got one as well.

I find the trick is to only allow yourself only a couple of hours towards close of play i.e. start it at 7pm. Otherwise, you spend far far too long trying to interpret what on earth they mean or want.

Afterall, its not as if they seem capable of doing much with the info anyway...

We all need to tell these quango's where to go and not fund them any more... All stop paying fees and the gravy train will grind to a halt....

A nice idea but impossible to coordinate. The only escape is to passport out and back. Even then the FSA will still be able to crucify you with whatever they feel like finding fault with as far as your anti-Money Laundering procedures are concerned. Parallels with the Gestapo spring to mind.