Top Tory slams FCA ‘mission creep’ after misconduct rules expanded

Shadow business secretary Andrew Griffith has slammed the UK financial watchdog for expanding rules on “non-financial misconduct”, which spans from bullying to harassment and violence.

In a post on X the former city minister described the new regulations as “grade A mission creep”, as the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) broadened their reach to apply to 37,000 more financial firms.

Griffith said the rules are a “perfect example of the unintended consequences of having too many well paid, deeply ‘woke’, public sector regulators making work for themselves”.

He added: “Harassment, let alone violence, is already covered by the criminal, employment and contract law.

“Clearly that conduct and those offences are wrong – I don’t condone or diminish in any way.”

This widening of the scope of these rules follows an increasing focus from the regulator on misconduct in finance, after it found a sharp rise in incidents in 2024 after surveying 1,000 firms.

The FCA said of the new rules: “Previously, it was often unclear when these types of behaviours [bullying and harassment] would amount to a conduct rules breach in a firm other than a bank.

“On September 1, 2026, the same rules will be extended to around 37,000 other regulated firms, increasing consistency across financial services.”

Wrong policy, wrong time?

The senior Tory and former Sky finance chief said that the rules are a distraction from the regulator’s mission to push for growth.

He said: “At a time the FCA should be straining every sinew to help the UK’s flagging competitiveness – and explaining to the Treasury the insanity of attacking international wealth creators – what on earth are they playing at?”

“There is more rain on the moon than London IPOs right now!”

Griffith conceded that current city minister Emma Reynolds “is one of the sensible ones”.

“I do think she ‘gets’ the City. But on the FCA she needs to get a grip.”

Since the start of the year, Rachel Reeves has been piling pressure on regulators to cut red tape from the economy and drive, rather than hinder, growth.

The Chancellor argued in November that financial regulation had “gone too far” in its mission to “eliminate risk”, with the side effect of hampering growth.

In January, FCA boss Nikhil Rathi told the Following the Rules podcast: “What can be categorised as non-financial misconduct is quite broad.”

“I don’t think we could realistically give completely precise rules for everything.”