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UK to submit appointment of head regulator to Parliamentary vetos

Chris Hamblin, Editor, London, 20 April 2016

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With the Daily Mail claiming from sources that HM Government promised the job of head of the Financial Conduct Authority to Andrew Bailey without considering any other candidates, Chancellor George Osborne has now decided to try to persuade Parliament to give the House of Commons a veto over Bailey's successors.

Osborne has communicated his concession to the influential Treasury Select Committee in a letter to its head, Andrew Tyrie MP. Although he used his position as Chancellor to make the appointment, which will come into force on 1 July, Osborne has now decided to rely instead on his position as a leading figure in the Conservative Party to make the next one. According to reports, his plan is for HM Government to recommend new appointments to the committee and for the House of Commons to vote on the result.

Tyrie seems to be going along with this, perhaps hoping that in future there will be no one-party majority in the Commons as there is now and perhaps also hoping that a vote in the House will somehow make the FCA - a company limited by share - more independent of its sole owner, the Government. He wrote to Compliance Matters: "The FCA needs demonstrably independent leadership. Parliament’s, and the committee’s, influence over the appointment and dismissal of the Chief Executive of the FCA has been greatly strengthened by the arrangements set out in the Chancellor’s letter. Parliament will now be better placed to safeguard the FCA from interference - or the perception of interference - by the Treasury or Treasury ministers.

"Quangos are acquiring huge powers across Government. Unless they are required by Parliament to explain their actions to select committees, the risk will be that many will be left unaccountable, in practice, to anybody. That is why a greater role for Parliament, and for select committees, in the appointment and dismissal of the people that head up these quangos is so important."

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