UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Nadhim Zahawi outlined proposals to reform the UK’s rules governing financial services and markets on Tuesday 19 July in his Mansion House Speech on the state of the UK economy, delivered at the City of London’s annual business dinner.
The proposals, which he presented to the national parliament on Wednesday, “gives us the tools we need to seize the opportunities of Brexit and create a safer, better system for consumers”, he explained.
The reform is to implement a new regulatory framework and will repeal “hundreds of pieces of retained EU law”, according to Mr Zahawi. This framework will “again be decided in the UK, for the UK, by the UK’s expert and independent regulators”, he added.
One of the aims of the new law is to move UK law away from the European Solvency II prudential framework for the insurance sector. “This reform will give UK insurers more flexibility to invest in long-term assets like infrastructure”, Mr Zahawi assured.
In addition, the UK government wants to end the double volume cap and the share trading obligation. The proposals for reform also includes new measures to strengthen the accountability of regulators and their relationship with government and stakeholders.
National regulatory authorities, on the other hand, will have the task of facilitating growth and competitiveness.
Since the agreement between the European Union and the United Kingdom on their post-Brexit bilateral relationship, access to the EU market for UK financial services providers has been subject to unilateral equivalence decisions between UK and EU regulations (see EUROPE 12632/9). In particular, the Commission decided in June to extend the equivalence recognition decisions of UK clearing houses until 30 June 2025 (see EUROPE 12919/22).
When contacted by EUROPE, the Commission had not reacted to these announcements at the time of going to press.
Proposals for reform: https://aeur.eu/f/2pj (Original version in French by Anne Damiani)