On 7 March 2025, the High Court (Freedman J) dismissed the claim of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Fair Banking for judicial review of the Financial Conduct Authority’s decision in 2021 not to seek to require banks to provide further redress to customers who may have been missold interest rate hedging products between 2001 and 2011. The decision under challenge was taken after a review conducted by Mr John Swift KC had concluded that the Financial Services Authority had been wrong in 2012/2013 to agree that a voluntary redress scheme should be confined to customers who met certain criteria intended to identify those more likely to be vulnerable to misselling. Some £2.2 billion of compensation was paid to customers under the redress scheme.
The judge held that the FCA’s decision following the Swift review not to seek to require banks to provide redress to those excluded from the scheme, and its conclusion that the scope of the scheme had been appropriate notwithstanding the criticisms made by Mr Swift, was not irrational, and that the FCA had not acted unfairly in not consulting on the decision. The case featured in The Lawyer’s Top 20 cases for 2024.
Richard Coleman KC appeared (along with Christopher Knight) for the FCA. The judge noted that the quality of the advocacy on both sides was of the highest order.
A copy of the judgment can be found here.
