David Burton-Sampson

Having worked for more years than I like to remember in financial services, I recognise the importance of regulation, but I also recognise that at times, regulation can be restrictive to economic growth, and given the size and contribution of the financial and insurance services industry, it is rightly an area of focus for reforms. Consumer protection is vital, but I am pleased that the Bill looks to simplify regulation while maintaining high protections and regulatory standards. I want to focus on two areas of particular interest to me. The first is the abolition of the Payment Systems Regulator and the transfer of responsibilities to the FCA. When I chaired the all-party parliamentary group on open finance and payments—the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Bobby Dean) has now taken over—this was a matter of regular discussion and interest for many members. Currently, four bodies are responsible for regulating different parts of the payments system: the Bank of England, the Payment Systems Regulator, the FCA and the PRA. Absorbing the PSR’s responsibilities into the FCA is a sensible reform, and it sits alongside the Government’s plans set out in the “National Payments Vision” in 2024. The payments sector has spent untold resources trying to satisfy two distinct bureaucratic masters on identical operational metrics, submitting duplicate data on financial crime and systemic resilience. By integrating those systems under a single FCA handbook framework, we can strip out this waste and allow our scaling payments and open banking firms to reinvest that capital back into technical development and national and international growth. The core message from the industry is that the absorption of the Payment Systems Regulator must be strictly managed to protect the open banking and payments sector from transitional friction, accelerate open banking rails and ensure that a single regulatory structure does not slow down the competitive dynamism of the UK’s payments sector. The Payments Association has warned that without precise detail of the merger, it risks being a “reshuffle” rather than a reform, and we must avoid that. Another area of particular interest to me is the plan to widen access to credit unions through the expansion of their common bond in clause 2. When I was chair of the all-party parliamentary group on fair banking, I was often lobbied by organisations such as Fair4All Finance, which made passionate calls for the expansion of credit unions and CDFIs. In 2025, there were around 1.53 million credit union members in Great Britain, but that is equivalent to only 2% of our population, compared with around 40% in Northern Ireland and 64% in the Republic of Ireland. Credit unions are much closer to their communities and their members, and therefore much better set up to take objective, local lending decisions, made by a human, based on the circumstances laid out in front of them, as opposed to a “computer says no” approach.