Interest Rate Swap Derivatives

Greg Mulholland Excerpts

Thursday 24th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Natascha Engel (North East Derbyshire) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Aberconwy (Guto Bebb), and it was a pleasure to see him before the Backbench Business Committee again, although we had hoped that the position would be resolved on the first occasion when he appeared before us. It was also a pleasure—here I echo the sentiments of other Members—to be a member of his all-party parliamentary group on interest rate mis-selling. The group has demonstrated the power and effectiveness that all-party parliamentary groups can display when they are organised around a single issue, particularly when the issue is an injustice of this kind. The Committee was delighted to be able to schedule today’s debate, and I hope that we shall have as much effect today as we did all those months ago.

I want to focus on just a couple of issues raised by the hon. Member for Aberconwy—in particular, the idea of a moratorium, but also the terrible way in which this issue has been allowed to drag on and on. It is not just the banks that are involved; the Treasury is involved as well, and we should also consider the role of the Financial Conduct Authority. When, many months ago, members of the FCA appeared before the all-party parliamentary group, many of us were unimpressed by their lack of a sense of urgency. Everyone recognised that they wanted the redress scheme to be drawn up properly, but they certainly did not show the sense of urgency that they had shown when signing people up to the mis-sold schemes when it came to the question of redress.

[Greg Mulholland (Leeds North West) (LD)]

I do not know whether the hon. Lady has experienced the problem experienced by certain other Members. When the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Andrew Jones) and I wrote to the Financial Standards Authority about a shared case, the FSA replied that it did not deal with individual cases. We then wrote to the Minister, who told us to raise the matter with the FSA. We are going around in circles. Do we not need a different body—possibly even the National Crime Agency—to get a grip on the issue?

[Natascha Engel]

That is a very good point. We have had any number of cases where they have been passed from pillar to post. One of the terrible aspects of all this is that the individuals affected do not know where they can go to get justice, and they certainly do not have very much time to do that, because their businesses are going bust while they are waiting for justice.