Mansions House speech: fraud measures may not go far enough

Commenting on the Chancellor’s Mansion House speech last night, Erin Sims, financial services senior analyst at RSM UK, said: “The Chancellor’s ambitions to boost growth and competitiveness in financial services are timely after only the day prior, Swedish fintech company, Klarna, chose to list in New York and not London. That said, the most recent report on The Global Financial Centres Index 36, which ranks 121 locations, showed London edged closer to New York as a leading financial hub. 

“By rebalancing the regulatory framework, this enables future growth and innovation. Moreover, the Chancellor’s commitment to sustainable finance is a bold move towards becoming a global leader in climate finance, particularly with the proposed legislation to regulate ESG ratings. The suggested reforms for the mutual and co-operative sector to “help unlock the full potential of the sector” are a positive step to promote inclusive growth and modernisation. It is certainly hoped that, collectively, these measures will boost innovation, attract international investment as well as focus on the transition to a greener economy. The first ever Financial Services Growth and Competitiveness Strategy set to be published in the spring is eagerly awaited.

“The Chancellor’s comments on combatting fraud with a coordinated effort are welcomed, however, measures may not go far enough. Fraud is the most frequently reported crime, representing over 40% of offences, yet arrests and prosecutions of fraud are minimal. Given the scale of the fraud, and with it evolving with the advancements of technology, a co-ordinated effort to combat fraud is crucial. Calls from those operating in the financial services industry will have been only partially answered with the government seeking for tech and telecommunication sectors to go “further and faster in reducing the scale of fraud taking place on their platforms and networks”. But it failed to detail how or if these sectors will be held to account for enabling fraud; in the first six months of 2024, 72% of fraud cases were enabled by online platforms and 16% of cases by telecoms, emphasising the need to clamp down on this area. Whether there will be further detail on this point in the expanded fraud strategy due to be released in March 2025 is not yet known.”