Farage's claim that Labour's financial regulation approach (1997–2010) simultaneously increased the volume of regulations while removing certain fundamental safeguards is well-supported by the evidence: 1. **Transfer of banking supervision from the Bank of England**: In 1997, Gordon Brown transferred banking supervision from the Bank of England to the new Financial Services Authority (FSA), formalized via the Bank of England Act 1998. The Bank of England's own retrospective noted this "nearly causing then-Governor Eddie George to resign on the spot." 2. **Move to principles-based regulation removed prescriptive rules**: The FSA explicitly moved "away from detailed prescriptive rules" to a principles-based approach. In 2007, the FSA's reform of its Conduct of Business rules aimed to "chop the business conduct rulebook in half," removing "much of the detail of the old rule book." 3. **"Light-touch" regulation later acknowledged as flawed**: Lord Turner, FSA chairman, acknowledged in 2011 that the regulator had been encouraged to take a "light touch" by Labour and that this approach had a "structural flaw." The Government's response to the Independent Commission on Banking stated that "regulators and supervisors failed to provide the robust scrutiny and challenge that was needed" and that the tripartite system had "inherent weaknesses." 4. **No leverage restriction**: The ICB final report noted there was "no restriction on leverage" — instead, limits were on capital-to-"risk-weighted" assets ratios, which proved unreliable. This allowed UK bank leverage to balloon to around forty times, "twice historically normal levels." While regulatory volume increased substantially (consolidation of nine regulatory bodies into the FSA, new statutory framework under FSMA 2000, expanded scope), clear evidence shows that certain basic rules and safeguards were simultaneously removed or weakened — the transfer of banking supervision away from the Bank of England, the reduction of prescriptive conduct-of-business rules by half, the adoption of light-touch principles-based regulation, and the absence of a leverage cap. Post-crisis assessments by official bodies (FSA, HM Treasury, ICB) acknowledged these as flaws that contributed to the crisis. Sources: - Bank of England Act 1998 (legislation.gov.uk) — https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/11/part/III/enacted - "Labour's Record on Financial Regulation" (Oxford Review of Economic Policy / Birkbeck eprints) — https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/6532/1/6532.pdf - "Labour's lax regulation of the City contributed to RBS collapse" (The Guardian, 12 Dec 2011) — https://www.theguardian.com/business/2011/dec/12/labour-regulations-city-rbs-collapse - Government response to the Independent Commission on Banking (HM Treasury, 2011) — https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a79856c40f0b63d72fc67f9/govt_response_to_icb_191211.pdf - ICB Final Report (2011) — https://ftalphaville-cdn.ft.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/ICB-Final-Report.pdf - "FSA: New rules are step to principles-based regulation" (Insurance Times) — https://www.insurancetimes.co.uk/fsa-new-rules-are-step-to-principles-based-regulation/1363020.article - "The Rise, Fall and Fate of Principles-based Regulation" (Julia Black, LSE) — https://onlinepubs.trb.org/onlinepubs/PBRLit/Black2010.pdf - Twenty years of Bank of England independence (Bank of England speech, 2017) — https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/-/media/boe/files/speech/2017/twenty-years-of-boe-independence-the-evolution-of-monetary-policy.pdf