Latest news with #TellSid
Yahoo
15-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Red tape is ‘boot on the neck of businesses', says Reeves
Red tape is a 'boot on the neck of businesses' and risks undermining the UK's dash for growth, Rachel Reeves has said. In a major City speech, the Chancellor on Tuesday night urged Britain's regulators to ditch their 'excessive caution' as she rewrote rules for banks and building societies to help more people on to the housing ladder, deliver better returns for savers and boost economic growth. She set out the plans in an address to City leaders and financial watchdogs at London's Mansion House alongside Andrew Bailey, the Bank of England Governor. It marked her first major speech since the Government's climbdown on welfare reforms, which have left the Chancellor scrambling to find billions of pounds to balance her Budget. Ms Reeves has been left with a choice of either raising taxes, attempting to cut spending again or relaxing her fiscal rules to allow her to borrow more. On Tuesday night she insisted there would be no change to the Government's borrowing policy. She said: 'The Prime Minister, this Government and I remain committed to our non-negotiable rules.' Instead, she set out plans to unshackle Britain's financial sector in bid to boost both growth and tax receipts. 'In too many areas, regulation still acts as a boot on the neck of businesses choking off the enterprise and innovation that is the lifeblood of growth,' she said. 'Regulators in other sectors must take up the call I make this evening not to bend to the temptation of excessive caution but to boldly regulate for growth in the service of prosperity across our country.' Ms Reeves said slashing red tape would create a 'ripple effect' across the economy 'putting pounds in the pockets of working people'. As part of the offensive, the Treasury has unveiled a string of City reforms targeting consumers, banks, insurers and international investors in an attempt to revive Britain's sluggish economy. The measures, called the Leeds Reforms, will rewrite mortgage rules to make it easier for people to borrow up to 4.5 times their income when buying a house, as well as making it easier to remortgage. Banks will also be allowed to start pitching stocks and bonds to ordinary investors through a new regime known as 'targeted support', having been banned from doing so in the aftermath of the financial crisis. Major financial institutions such as Barclays and NatWest are also backing an advertising campaign with echoes of the 'Tell Sid' British Gas scheme in the 1980s to urge people to buy shares. Despite pledging to rip up red tape, Ms Reeves has been accused of excessive Government meddling after handing herself the power to force pension funds to invest in the UK. Charlie Nunn, the chief executive of Lloyds Bank, recently compared the scheme to capital controls in Communist China, while Mr Bailey has also spoken out against the powers. Ms Reeves downplayed the significance of the new regime, saying she was 'confident that I will not need to use that power because firms see the urgency and importance of this as clearly as I do'. Since taking over as Chancellor, Ms Reeves has proved to be one of the most interventionist politicians to hold the post since Gordon Brown took power in 1997. Earlier this year Ms Reeves wrote to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) and the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) along with a number of other watchdogs asking them for a list of five things to boost growth. In a sign of her intent, the Chancellor effectively removed Marcus Bokkerink – the chairman of the CMA – after losing faith in his leadership. As part of her reform package, the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) will also have a number of its powers removed amid fears that its rulings were creating onerous new rules for the City through the backdoor. Ms Reeves said the changes would return the FOS to its 'original purpose as a simple, impartial arbitration service and ensure that it no longer acts as a quasi-regulator'. The Chancellor's attempt to unshackle the City echoes similar measures announced by her predecessors. Jeremy Hunt set out his own package of Mansion House reforms in 2023, while Rishi Sunak set out a 'road map' to make Britain a world leader in green finance in 2021. Past reforms have yet to meaningfully change the country's growth trajectory. Karim Haji, head of financial services at KPMG, said of the reform package: 'The critical test will be in their execution and how quickly these proposals can translate into real, measurable benefits for firms, investors and consumers.' Ashok Gupta, of New Capital Consensus, a campaign group, said: 'The Chancellor's first shot at fixing the system is in the right direction, but the ball has barely landed on the fairway. It needs to swing harder and with greater purpose with its next shot, or it's game over. 'The future of the UK economy and Labour's re-election hopes depends on getting this right.' Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Times
27-06-2025
- Business
- Times
London Stock Exchange chief calls for new ‘Tell Sid' campaign
The head of the London Stock Exchange has called for a 'Tell Sid'-style campaign to encourage the public to invest as part of efforts to rescue Britain's faltering equities market. Dame Julia Hoggett said on Friday that despite a series of reforms by the government and regulators in recent years to try to make the UK market more attractive 'we have still not seen the real turning point in terms of flows of risk capital within and into the UK'. She argued that 'a lot of investors are more fearful of investing in the real economy than investing in cryptocurrency' and that 'now is the time for a long-term public campaign that would demystify investing'. This should be a 'Tell Sid 2.0' to get Britain investing, Hoggett said, referring to the famous advertising blitz by the Thatcher government to encourage households to buy shares in British Gas during its 1986 privatisation. It is the second time in less than two years that the idea of reviving 'Tell Sid' has been floated and comes amid mounting concern that the London stock market is shrinking. The market's woes are partly being driven by a lack of demand for UK equities, which has depressed valuations and led to companies being taken private and deterred private businesses from listing on the exchange. The previous Conservative government planned a retail offer of NatWest shares as part of the process of reprivatising the bank, with Jeremy Hunt, who was then chancellor, saying: 'It's time to get Sid investing again.' However, the initiative was scrapped by the new Labour government last July. Rachel Reeves, Hunt's successor, claimed it was 'a bad use of taxpayers' money'. • Encouraging savers to buy shares is worthy, but stunts won't help Even so, Reeves signalled in February that she wanted 'to create more of a culture in the UK of retail investing like what you have in the United States'. The number of Britons investing in the stock market stands at 23 per cent, whereas in the US stock market participation is 61 per cent. One way the government might do this is by imposing tighter limits on the amount savers can put into cash Isas each year, to nudge them into shares. This idea has faced resistance in some quarters, and Reeves has yet to announce a consultation on changes to Isas, although one might be unveiled when she sets out the government's strategy for the financial services sector next month. Hoggett, 51, was speaking at a conference hosted on Friday by the Capital Markets Industry Taskforce, a lobbying body she chairs, where top officials from British regulators insisted they were playing their part to boost the City and the economy, and heeding government calls to cut red tape, although they said this required more risk-taking in society. Richard Moriarty, who runs the Financial Reporting Council, which oversees corporate governance and audits, said that guidance on governance 'infantilises boards [who] need to think for themselves'. Sarah Pritchard, the deputy chief executive of the Financial Conduct Authority, told the conference that 'if we have more companies listing then some of them will fail and that should be OK and the first reaction shouldn't be, 'There must be something wrong with the regulation.'' She also signalled that proposals were imminent to help consumers to manage their finances.
