Financial Services

John Glen Excerpts

Thursday 26th April 2018 Westminster Hall

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

I am glad to be able to speak for the Scottish National party in this debate.

I am sure the Brexiteers will accuse me of not being optimistic enough, but having looked the issues for financial services in the UK post-Brexit, I cannot help but have some apprehension. I understand that a lot of people in the industry are apprehensive as well. The challenges are huge and significant.

We have the best possible set-up in financial services with the EU, whether with regard to co-operation, influence or regulation. We are part of the decision-making process and have been key players in the set-up of financial services across the EU. There is no doubt that we will not be able to replicate the influence we have, because that influence is born from being part of the EU and a member of the single market and the customs union. The UK Government must seriously consider that reckless approach. The financial services sector provides a good illustration of why remaining in the single market and the customs union is the least-damaging option for the UK’s and Scotland’s economy. Brexit is a key risk to that sector.

The financial services industry is huge—the figures were mentioned by the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford)—and, as she said, Scotland is a key part of it. Many financial services jobs are outside London. Edinburgh has 49,800 employees in the industry—a significant number—but Glasgow has 36,300 employees or thereabouts. Nearly 60% of employment in financial and related professional services in Scotland is concentrated in those cities. Edinburgh has an important international financial centre and a strong presence in banking, life insurance and investment management activities, and Glasgow has strengths in insurance, legal services and accountancy, but Aberdeen and Fife employ a large number of people in the industry.

As the Member for Glasgow Central, it would be remiss of me not to talk about Glasgow which, since 2001, has developed its international financial services district. That has rejuvenated an area in the city that had been left behind by old industries, with warehouses and neglected areas near the Broomielaw. It has been redeveloped into a hugely vibrant sector of the city. Many large companies based there employ people in high-value jobs. Those companies were able to get buildings, set up to work and employ people locally.

The IFSD has attracted £1 billion of investment to the area, so it is no small project. It has brought in more than 15,500 new jobs through investment and expansion by working in partnership with the city council, Scottish Development International, Scottish Enterprise and Skills Development Scotland, to name a few.

It worries me greatly that Glasgow, which is recognised in the global financial centres index as the 14th most competitive financial centre in Europe, would lose out as a result of the reckless move towards leaving the EU, the customs union and the single market. It concerns me because when jobs go in London, London may be able to absorb it, but the economies of Edinburgh and Glasgow are more peripheral in the UK set-up. The UK has a London-focused economy. Without any great control in the Scottish Parliament over such things, I am concerned that we will not be able to put the mechanisms in place to protect those industries as we would like to do. We are at the whim of what the UK Government decide to do.

I hope the Minister can tell us more about the White Paper that the Government were due to publish last summer on the approach to Brexit and financial services. As I understand, that has not yet been brought forward. I asked the Library for an update on its report from July on financial services and Brexit, and although it could give me an update, it could not give me much progress, because not much has been made—certainly not anything visible or tangible. That concerns me and the sector greatly because of the uncertainty. We should be in no doubt that the sector has to plan and make decisions. The more uncertainty there is, the greater the risk of losing jobs.

Predictably, the European Banking Authority has decided to move to Paris. There are moves afoot from France to build up its sector and to regain what it feels it has lost to the UK in terms of financial services expertise. There is a risk, and other countries are looking to step into the void that we are leaving. The transition agreement merely extends the deadline to reach a deal to the end of 2020. The financial services industry needs and deserves more certainty so it can plan for that.

Not only will we lose financial institutions and companies, but those companies will not have the automatic access to EU markets that they currently have. That loss of influence is significant for the companies that base themselves here, for the decisions and investments that they make and for the jobs they create.

We will also lose influence in Government and between Governments. We will not be in those decision-making rooms where the regulations are being drawn up. We will not have the early influence that we have through EU institutions. We have set a lot of the rules, but in future, at most, we will be able to take rules, which is a huge difference.

The Minister has acknowledged that in an article, where he wrote:

“We know how important it is to the financial services industry that they have continued market access”.

I am sure he will tell us more about what he intends to do about that. Market access is not the same as being part of a market or a component in that market. Market access is second best. The Tories are delusional if they think we will get a better deal than we have at the moment.

Remaining in the European Economic Area could enable financial passporting to continue. That is crucial, because equivalence is nowhere near as uniform and comprehensive as passporting. It does not cover the full range of services currently sold by UK-based firms into the EU, or the full range of clients. As I understand it, banking services could not be offered under an equivalence regime.

Many are deeply concerned about what would happen if there was policy divergence between us and the EU in future, because that could result in the Commission revoking access to those markets with only 30 days’ notice. If a regulatory change that we disagreed with was agreed by the EU, such as a cap on bankers’ bonuses, that could be enough to trigger that denial of services. Switzerland’s referendum to limit immigration from the EU triggered such a response from the EU.

That is worrying given the Government’s attitude to immigration and how they want to treat immigration from all parts of the world—not just the Windrush generation, but EU nationals. Many constituents who come to my surgeries are in highly skilled jobs and have come here as highly skilled migrants. They have found that, because they made a minor change to their tax returns many years ago, the Government deem them a threat to national security under paragraph 322.5 of the immigration rules. If that is how they treat the highly skilled migrants who come to this country to contribute, work and generate wealth, I have little confidence that they will do anything to improve the situation. That is how people are being treated now. How will they treat EU nationals who have come to work in the finance sector?

Some 9,000 EU nationals work in the financial and business services sector in Scotland. Each of those people brings wealth to this country, pays their taxes, has a family, works here and has settled here. They have no great certainty about their future status, how their employers will employ them and whether they will have the right to work as they do now, which is a huge worry.

Those individuals are making decisions as to whether they want to stay here on the basis of what they hear and see. The mood music around immigration has not been very welcoming. Those narratives are almost certainly causing many of them to give up and leave. The Minister is sighing somewhat at that, but that is the reality—that is what I get at my surgeries.

[The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (John Glen)]

I am not. I am listening very carefully.

[Alison Thewliss]

People are not sure what will happen, and they need to have more certainty before they make their decisions. Just as people in the financial sector are making decisions about where their businesses will go, individual employees are deciding as well.

My husband works as an IT professional in Glasgow and knows many people in the sector. They are highly sought-after, highly skilled and well-paid jobs, but they are tied to financial institutions in the city such as J.P. Morgan and Barclays. If those financial institutions contract, those IT jobs, which are highly skilled, will contract too. We need to think carefully about the full pipeline of people. It is not just about bankers in suits sitting in offices; it is the full ecosystem. Those bankers buy lunch, commute into towns and take public transport.

Glasgow has a long and distinguished history in banking. The Bank of Scotland opened its doors in 1695. The Royal Bank of Scotland has its global headquarters in Edinburgh, the Clydesdale Bank has its European headquarters in Glasgow and there are lots of other banking operations in Scotland. I have mentioned Barclays, but HSBC and others also have a presence within Scotland.

Scotland’s general insurance, life insurance and pensions sectors also have a strong reputation and an enviable history of success, with their origins dating back to the early 1700s, when the increase in international trade led to a requirement for marine insurance, and Scotland continues to be a major centre for that sector.

The hon. Member for Chelmsford mentioned the insurance industry. The Association of British Insurers is deeply concerned about the current uncertainty. It has contracts that run for 10 years and pension contracts that run for more than 30 years, and has pointed out that

“these contracts cannot be transferred safely and quickly to a new EU location. Special arrangements would be needed to transfer the contracts, covering both legal form and regulatory responsibility…If nothing is fixed, insurers will be left in an impossible position and face an unacceptable choice: break their promise to customers or risk breaking the law.”

That is deeply serious and I hope the Government are looking at it. It is a huge concern for the sector, which relies on confidence and its reputation.

Fund management in Scotland encompasses a broad mix of large institutional companies and smaller boutique firms that provide investment services to institutional and personal clients around the world. The quality of investment management expertise in Scotland has led to a robust growth in boutique firms and new business start-ups. We have also become a major European centre for asset servicing.

Looking forward, Scottish Government analysis shows that a hard Brexit threatens to cost our economy £12.7 billion—£2,300 per person—a year by 2030, compared with what would happen if we remained in the EU. The UK Government’s analysis is that reverting to World Trade Organisation rules could reduce growth by 8%; that a free trade agreement with the EU would reduce growth by 5%; and that membership of the European Economic Area would reduce growth by 2%.

The EU is the largest single market for Scotland’s international exports—in 2016, Scottish exports to the EU were worth £12.7 billion. The Fraser of Allander Institute estimates that 134,000 Scottish jobs are supported by EU trade. Last week, a report for Citibase, a service provider to small and medium-sized enterprises, found that 63% of Scotland’s SMEs would like to reverse the Brexit process and remain in the single market. That report also found that just 14% of Scotland’s SMEs trusted the UK Government to get a good deal on Brexit. Steve Jude, the chief executive officer of Citibase, has said:

“The message is clear. Scottish confidence in the Westminster Government to secure a good deal for them is at an all-time low, with most SMEs wanting to press the reset button on the entire process.”

The Government should take on board those concerns, because we do not have to leave the EU. Yes, the EU referendum produced a UK-wide result, but there was no mandate for leaving the customs union and the single market, and we must think very carefully about the potential damage that leaving the EU would do to our economy, which would hurt all of us and all of our constituents.

The hon. Members for Chelmsford and for North East Derbyshire (Lee Rowley) mentioned bank closures, which are of huge concern to our constituents right across the country. That is particularly true for RBS, in which the Government have the leading share. We own RBS and we should be telling it that it is unacceptable to renege on the trust we have put in it—we helped it to get back on its feet—by whipping away services to our communities. We have heard Members from across this House—not just Scottish National party Members but Conservative Members—criticising RBS for saying that it would provide banking services and send its vans around before pulling back on that as well. RBS has reneged not once but twice. RBS has provided a limited service, which are the bank vans it sends around. Those vans do not have disabled access, which has led to people being served in car parks in the wind, rain and all weathers. That is a ridiculous situation and the Government should do more to put pressure on RBS.

The hon. Member for North East Derbyshire mentioned the idea, which has a lot of merit, of a shared service point for bank branches. Banks should come together to see what they can do collaboratively so that their customers are not left with nothing. I know people from other parties have mentioned that idea. It definitely has merit.

Hon. Members have mentioned on the record dirty money, the importance of clamping down on money laundering and the SNP position on the scandal of Scottish limited partnerships being used for money laundering. I hope there will be progress on tackling SLPs and addressing their lack of accountability. We have tabled amendments to the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill to that end, but if the Government are not going to take them on board, as I had hoped they would, I hope they will bring something else forward soon so that we can deal with that.

The major issue that prevents a clampdown on money laundering is the Companies House loophole. I have mentioned that to the Economic Secretary to the Treasury before—he has heard my views on it. Just recently, we had the strange case of the businessman Kevin Brewer, who fully admitted what he was trying to do in testing the Companies House loophole. However, he was fined and found guilty of crimes related to money laundering when all he was trying to do was to prove that the system was absolutely defunct and open to all kinds of corruption.

The Government have hailed the prosecution of Kevin Brewer, but all they have done in this case is to shoot the messenger. This man was deliberately trying to do something—he told the people he involved in this activity exactly what he was going to do. There has been a clampdown on this person but there is no clampdown on the many hundreds of people—at least—who abuse the Companies House loophole by paying their £12 to register a company with no checks whatsoever by Companies House as to the veracity of that person.

If someone applies for any other Government service such as a passport or a form to do their tax returns, they have to go through the Government’s Verify system. This situation is allowing people to set up companies with no checks on them whatsoever. It is wide open to money laundering and corruption. The Government need to take heed of that and take action.

The hon. Member for North East Derbyshire said the EU was “playing politics”. I found that comment slightly bizarre, because it is playing politics that has got us into this situation in the first place. A weak Tory Government, pandering to its Back Benchers, led us into the EU referendum and to the calamitous situation we are in. If anyone is playing politics, it is the Conservative party, and we need to get a lot more serious than playing politics because there is so much at stake.

The hon. Gentleman also mentioned innovation within financial services. That is an area where the UK has taken a great lead. I was on holiday in the US recently, over the Easter period. I found it astonishing that US companies do not even have chip and pin, never mind contactless payment, for their financial transactions. In this building and in other buildings in the UK, we are used to being able just to tap our cards to make a payment, so I found it bizarre to be given a slip of paper to sign. US companies find our position unusual, whereby we can just tap something and pay with our phone or a card. There is an interesting contrast between where we are and where they are in terms of technology—there are huge advances coming along in financial technology and other areas.

Hopefully, if we get any kind of Brexit deal right, FinTech will continue to blossom. Staying within the single market and the customs union gives us the best possible chance of using and developing our expertise and making it sellable to the rest of the world through the EU, which of course has a huge customer base.

I will close my remarks by saying that the problems within the financial sector are clear with regard to the EU and Brexit. The sector has made clear the difficulties that are arising, and the impact that those difficulties will have on jobs and on our economy, but we are coming up very close to the date when we will leave the EU, and the solutions are not there. The transition period will give only a little extra time for that process and does not give the reassurance required.

We need solutions from this Government and we need them soon. We need a White Paper and solutions that will make a difference to companies and give them reassurance before they decide that they will just take flight, and take with them so many jobs and so much else that they give to the UK economy.

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[The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (John Glen)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford) on securing the debate, and my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire (Lee Rowley) and the hon. Members for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) and for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds) on their contributions.

We have had a very well-informed discussion of a wide range of financial services issues. It felt as if every discussion I have had over the last three and a half months as a Minister has been put under scrutiny. I will try to respond to all the points raised. I acknowledge the deep knowledge and experience of my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford, in both her work in financial services, infrastructure and project financing and, more recently, her work as a Member of the European Parliament, particularly on the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs.

Before I get into the substance of the issues, it would be useful to acknowledge that today’s debate is occurring not in a vacuum, but in the context of a strong and resilient economy. GDP growth has remained solid at 1.8% in 2017, extending the period of continuous growth to five years. That is higher than the 1.5% forecast at the autumn Budget. The UK economy has beaten expectations, and the Treasury and the Government will continue to set ourselves the mission to beat the forecasts. As Economic Secretary to the Treasury, I am committed, along with my Treasury officials, to ensuring that the financial services industry retains its place on the mantel as a beacon of prosperity for this country.

As I continue to tell industry and my colleagues in Government, financial services constitute the plumbing of this country’s economy. We do not want to be reticent about describing and applauding that. Financial services, as others have mentioned, represent 12% of total UK economic output, and the industry contributed £72.1 billion to the Exchequer in 2016-17—11% of total Government tax receipts. It is a critical industry for our nation.

As others have also mentioned, more than 1 million people are employed in the financial and insurance sector in the UK. Some 63% of those jobs are outside London, with 52% outside London and the south-east. That includes 98,000 in the north-west, and 87,000 in Scotland—including, I understand, that of the spouse of the hon. Member for Glasgow Central. Those figures represent the livelihoods of people up and down this country and, as the hon. Lady pointed out, they represent a multitude of jobs beyond the square mile. As I often point out, there is a whole ecosystem of support services and economic activity related to financial services. Bank tellers, mortgage brokers, salespeople, and IT staff form the backbone of this industry in the UK.

The Government’s approach to financial services is based on ensuring that the sector does what it should: effectively channelling savings and capital flows into productive investment to allow the real economy to manage financial risk, take advantage of commercial opportunities, and boost economic prosperity up, down and across the country.

Our historical success has been based on being the most open and dynamic financial hub in the world and having the deftness to continuously innovate and adapt, but there is no room for complacency. We cannot and will not rest on our laurels. The success of financial services has helped elevate the UK to the status of a post-industrial economy. My hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford made reference to the industrial strategy, which was launched in November 2017 to prepare the whole UK economy for the future. We are taking action across a range of sectors. We published an investment management strategy. I look forward to responding to the recommendations of the green finance taskforce, which reported in March. We are poised to continue to be leaders in innovating in these sectors, to capture the value of innovation, capitalise on all opportunities and speed prosperity to all regions of the United Kingdom.

Close alignment between our financial sector and other parts of the economy is therefore crucial to the success of our industrial strategy. Financial services is a high-growth, high-tech driver of the UK economy and we are working to ensure that, in the face of rapid change, the UK remains the No. 1 place in the world to conduct financial services business. We are fully committed to that mandate, as demonstrated in the announcement of our FinTech sector strategy last month, which is intentionally aligned with and complementary to our industrial strategy.

I want to run through current Government thinking on the regulation of financial services, which is key to how the sector will thrive in a post-Brexit Britain. I also want to reassure hon. Members that the changes required to the financial services regulatory framework following our exit from the EU are an integral part of the Treasury’s exit planning. The Government are listening to the views of industry—the International Regulatory Strategy Group was mentioned—and of course to those across Parliament. I look forward to further work with my Treasury colleagues on financial services regulation as we prepare for our departure from the European Union.

Following the financial crisis 10 years ago, the Government introduced necessary changes to seek to restore public trust in financial services. I recognise that that has been a long and difficult process, but we continue to attract international commendation for the robustness of our regulatory and prudential systems. In the last round of the Financial Sector Assessment Program, the International Monetary Fund found that the UK was fully compliant on the 19 Basel core principles for effective banking supervision. Only France and Switzerland are able to match that. A decade on from the crisis, we should never lose sight of the principal purpose of the regulatory and supervisory regimes: to ensure financial stability and protect taxpayers from having to step in to deal with failure. The key lesson from the financial crisis has been cross-border co-operation, not a global race to the bottom or destabilising protectionism.

That thinking extends to our approach to Brexit. It is crucial that our exit from the EU is smooth and orderly. As my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford said, we made a big step forward in agreeing the legal text on an implementation period, which will keep market access on existing terms for firms and consumers. In December, the Government said that, if necessary, we will legislate to ensure that the contractual obligations she mentioned continue to be met, which will benefit millions of UK consumers who have insurance policies from EU firms. It is in the interests of the EU to take similar measures for UK firms serving EU customers, and we continue to encourage co-operation between regulators. We are working on that active dialogue all the time.

It defies logic that a loose relationship with the UK would give the EU the depth of co-operation necessary for a market as close as the UK, and vice versa. That means—I want to be crystal clear—that we do not intend to rip up the rule book after exit. When I hear echoes that there should be a bonfire of financial services regulation post-exit, or a race to the bottom, nothing could be further from the truth.

On 7 March, the Chancellor set out a vision for our future relationship in financial services in what has been called his HSBC speech. The hon. Member for Glasgow Central asked about that vision. It was a thorough analysis of the challenge and the opportunity and the need to prioritise financial stability, and argued for a deal that preserves the mutual benefits of the sector. Neither the UK or EU should be under any illusion about the significant additional costs that would be borne by Europe’s businesses and consumers if this highly efficient market were to fragment. It is a complex ecosystem that serves the UK and the EU. Oliver Wyman calculates that the wholesale banking industry would need to find $30 billion to $50 billion of extra capital if new regulatory barriers forced fragmentation of firms’ balance sheets.

To echo the Chancellor, the major winners from fragmentation would not—despite what President Macron suggests—be Paris or Frankfurt, Dublin or Luxembourg, but New York, Singapore or Hong Kong. That point was made by the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde.

[Jonathan Reynolds]

I agree entirely with the Minister’s analysis but he would surely recognise that the transition period can come into play only if the Northern Irish issue is solved. The only way to solve the Northern Ireland issue is with a customs union, and the only way to solve where the country is on that is to let the House of Commons vote on it. Does the Minister know whether the Trade Bill will come back to the House at any point in the near future to give the it the chance to resolve the issue and get the benefits he is describing?

[John Glen]

The hon. Gentleman has made a valiant attempt to try to draw out from me something over which, as he is probably very aware, I have little control. I do share with him an appreciation of the centrality of financial services in the City of London and we have a shared understanding that, if the EU does not come to a place of understanding about City of London financial services, it would leave Europe a lot less competitive.

To address that, the Chancellor set out what our future regulatory framework should look like, underpinned by three things: a binding dialogue for regulatory requirements, supervisory co-operation arrangements that are reciprocal and reliable, and an independent arbitration mechanism to provide durable dispute resolution. That is clear. It is complex, but necessarily so, given what we are dealing with.

Reaching such an agreement with the EU need not be a challenging objective because the status quo is an unbeatable precedent to work from. Our markets are already deeply interconnected; our rule books are identical; and our mutual commitment to world-leading standards is unbeatable. The EU itself has challenged the notion that financial services cannot be addressed in trade negotiations, as evidenced in its approach to creating a deep bilateral framework with the US in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership negotiations. In those negotiations, the EU pitched a relationship based on mutual recognition of regulations and a unique dialogue on aligning future rule-making. TTIP is a precedent for the approach that we wish to take with the EU. It is in neither the UK’s nor the EU’s interest to exclude financial services from the future relationship.

The UK is clear that there are limitations to how much either of us can achieve unilaterally. The reality is that the European Council and European Parliament have now formally recognised the need to address the terms of market access in financial services between the UK and the EU, so we need to come to the table and discuss it further.

Myriad financial services on which businesses rely to reduce their costs are derived from or pass through, or are linked to, the UK market. Businesses also reap the benefits of the savings and capital flows to consumers across the continent. Those flows untap greater financial prospects for a broad range of people and allow them to access new products and services, such as innovative investment opportunities, tailored and appropriate debt products, and technology-driven solutions such as open banking.

My hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire talked about shared services in the context of the challenges relating to bank closures. The only inhibitor to that is the banks themselves—there is no restriction on finding a shared venue. I know from my conversations with banks in my constituency that phenomenal changes are going on in the age profile of bank users. Just before the Easter recess, I took the opportunity to visit different banking environments and a mobile banking facility in Derbyshire. I was very impressed with what I saw. It happened to be a Lloyds mobile bank, and it came to the village twice a week at the same time. It had disabled facilities. Of course, we all want to retain that certainty about the bank network, but that is not possible because it is a commercial decision. I am in active dialogue with a range of banks, as we all are as constituency MPs, and I know that these are difficult decisions. I commend my hon. Friend’s suggestion, and I raise it actively when I meet representatives of banks.

[Vicky Ford]

On bank branch closures, I too commend the suggestion about bringing together many banks to operate out of the same premises, although that could be difficult to achieve. People have raised with me the issue of depositing cash. The people who run the church or school fête tend to have large quantities of small denominations of cash. Is there more we can do to ensure that the Post Office offers that service?

[John Glen]

UK Finance and the Post Office have come to a new understanding about how the Post Office’s services are made available if the last bank leaves a town or community. In 99% of cases, the services that an individual non-business customer would wish to use are accessible in post offices. There are some limits—this needs to be checked, but I am pretty sure it is £2,000 in cash—but alternative arrangements can be made if necessary. Although I accept that in some cases there is a cultural barrier to the widespread use of post offices, there is no functional reason why they cannot provide the vast majority—99%—of the services that most consumers and 95% of small businesses want. I urge my hon. Friend to look into those options and make that clear to her constituents.

[Alison Thewliss]

On business customers, does the Minister agree that the closure of bank branches in rural areas means that staff have to cover longer distances, in some cases carrying large sums of cash backwards and forwards? Has he raised with banks the concern that carrying money around in that way can put people at risk?

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[John Glen]

I thank the hon. Lady for that point. I do not believe I have made that point to the head of a bank yet, but it is certainly something I would be happy to take up, particularly given the rurality of some communities.

Let me move back to my script. The industry in the UK has matured and developed in the UK as a creator of wealth for a broad spectrum of people across the world. Firms based in the UK do business with and have exposure to jurisdictions across the globe. We need to ensure that investors and banks from across the world can continue to come together to meet and transact, which means embracing the exciting commercial opportunities that will define international capital markets over the coming decades. The UK already has world-leading positions in the markets of the future, including FinTech, for which we have developed what we call FinTech bridges to other jurisdictions—most recently Australia. We are world leaders in green and sustainable finance, and in rupee and renminbi products, and we are committed to strengthening that position further. That also means expanding our bilateral relationships with key partners around the globe, which includes our economic and financial dialogues with China, India, Brazil, Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore and Japan. There are enormous growth opportunities for the future.

Our new financial regulatory working group with the US, launched last week, cemented the already strong and deep relationship between the UK and US regulators. All of that will increase our financial co-operation with priority overseas markets and further establish the UK as the partner of choice for financial services.

As has been made clear, the significance of financial services to this country’s economy cannot be understated. It has propelled the UK to greater heights and its people to greater prosperity. I thank all hon. Members who have contributed to this very useful discussion, which has highlighted to me what a privilege it is to represent these interests in Government. Beyond Brexit, the Government are committed to creating the right environment so that this industry can continue to thrive.