Financial Ombudsman - Strengthen regulation

THE number of complaints made to the Financial Ombudsman increased by 36% last year.

As these came from customers who felt that they were given either poor advice or service leading to poor returns on investments in 2007, we can expect an even greater increase next year.

The ombudsman had to deal with just under 6,000 complaints about banks, building societies and other financial institutions. The greatest increase dealt with investments which more than doubled to over 1,000.

We have seen how our system for regulating the banks failed utterly and how some bankers took advantage of this laxity to feather their own nests.

So many of these institutions have shown themselves incapable of behaving either wisely or honestly that regulation and regulatory bodies must be strengthened. There is no point in going through this current crisis if we allow the culture that led to it to survive.