Financial Services and Markets Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Mackinlay of Richborough and Baroness Lawlor

Report stage
Monday 7th September 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Lawlor (Con)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe’s amendment, which would leave out Clause 3. I very much agree with the noble, Lord Vaux, and other noble Lords who have spoken.

I support these amendments on constitutional grounds, because of the importance of the separation of powers and the role of Parliament in checking executive power, as my noble friend Lord Massey mentioned. How can we hold the Government to account if we have no knowledge of the powers proposed? Clause 3 allows the Treasury the power to make any regulations it considers appropriate. We have no knowledge of what they are. Clause 3 also gives the Treasury power to delegate powers to the FCA. It allows the FCA to “make rules”,

“amend an Act of Parliament”

or

“make different provision for different purposes”.

There are many concerns about the regulators. I will mention two. First, the regulators do not supervise or explore predictably in accordance with their own rules. You will find different interpretations given to their rules in their rulings. We must ensure that their decisions are consistent between firms which operate businesses of similar sizes. Secondly, formal decisions by the regulators do not necessarily include sufficient explanation to serve as precedents to allow the application of the relevant rules.

I am very pleased to welcome the Minister to the Front Bench and to say how much we miss the noble Lord, Lord Stockwood, but I wish the Minister well. It is on constitutional grounds that I ask him to think very carefully about these amendments.

[Lord Mackinlay of Richborough (Con)]

My Lords, I will say a couple of words on Amendment 10 in the name of my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe, which I fully support. The phrase:

“The Treasury may by regulations make such provision as they consider appropriate in connection with providing access to banking services”,


is not just wide; it is ocean-wide. It is far too wide, and it is without parliamentary consent or any investigation as to what our democratic processes consider to be the right level of banking services and access to banking across this country.

I will also say a few words on Amendment 8. I am very pleased that the noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, spoke about the Post Office. When I was a constituency MP, I faced—as anyone who lives in any part of this country faced—the closure of banking services, which always caused concern, particularly to older residents. I purposely kept my father, now deceased, away from digital banking because of the risk of scams and of those dodgy emails coming in. He was of perfectly sound mind and very capable, but he perhaps was not as scam aware as younger people are, so I wanted him a long way away from digital banking services—and why should he not stay away from digital banking services?

We were always told by the banks that were closing, “Fear not: we have a Post Office network for all that your constituents and customers need to do in terms of access to cash, banking cheques and that more standard stuff”. I do not know about other noble Lords, but I use digital banking—of course I do. However, when faced with cheques, which are a little bit rarer these days than they used to be, I struggle—for obvious reasons—to hold the camera and go up a bit, left a bit, right a bit, down a bit, get told, “It’s not all in the picture yet”, and press the button. I am sure we all share that frustration. Let me leave your Lordships with this about the Post Office: it is not the panacea of everything. Over the last few months, Lloyds Bank has stopped the use of Post Office services to its customers. I do not know why. This is a two-way street: at the banks’ discretion, they can have a relationship with the Post Office or not. For reasons known only to itself, Lloyds has decided not to use the services of the Post Office. For those reasons, I sympathise massively with the noble Lord, Lord Vaux, who now has to make a 100-mile round trip to a bank. No doubt there is a post office nearer than that, but if you are a Lloyds customer, hard luck: 100 miles.

This is not about the quantity and texture of tomato sauce in a can of beans, which might lead to officials and statutory instruments; these are fundamentals of life that everybody faces on a daily basis. To allow the extent of this power is a power too far. We see far too much Henry VIII in all legislation, not just from this Government but from the Government I was with over the years. There has been a temptation for this creep to happen, and it must not enter the Bill.