Mel Stride vows ‘Big Bang’ as he targets careful City
Shadow Chancellor Sir Mel Stride is set to promise a new “Big Bang” on City regulation in a speech at a Conservative conference this weekend harking back to Margaret Thatcher’s financial reforms.
Stride is set to decry the lack of risk-taking across the UK economy and suggest regulation has been a “vast yoke” on businesses.
He will outline previously announced party commitments to slash rules around diversity and net zero, many of which were introduced under the previous Conservative administration.
In the speech, he is expected to say: “Regulation stifles growth, reduces employment, holds back investment.
“And for far too long, regulation after regulation has been quietly piled on top of our businesses, whereby little by little has become much too much – a vast yoke around the shoulders of every business in the land.”
He is also set to take aim at cautiousness in the City, suggesting that there has been an approach to “manage virtually every possible risk out of the system”.
“More broadly across financial services, if anything hurts consumers, liability has too often been disproportionately shifted onto companies.
“But that hurts business and in turn all of us more widely. For example, if you require people to take expensive financial advice that they may not need before they can invest, then people will invest less.”
He will conclude his speech with call for a “new Big Bang” to back “risk-takers who drive growth”.
Stride to criticise City’s ‘approach’
Stride’s speech will aim to position the party on the side of investors amid threats from Reform UK on boosting its financial credentials.
Last year, deputy leader Richard Tice delivered a speech in which he said the party would look to introduce a “Big Reform” for financial services.
The party has put its focus on overhauling pensions, the lengthy tax code, quangos and small businesses’ access to capital.
In the speech, he also hit out at the growing pile of public sector debt as a share of GDP while raising questions of bodies including the Bank of England, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), the Prudential Regulation Authority and the Financial Conduct Authority.
Robert Jenrick, who has since joined the party and been appointed “shadow chancellor”, has since said the Bank of England and OBR will remain as independent bodies.
Before the last general election, Labour made similar promises on to curry favour with the City as Rachel Reeves said the party would make for the “most pro-business government this country has ever seen”.
Reeves has also staked her plans for economic growth on deregulation, including last year’s Leeds Reforms.