Bio World

Interest Rate Swap Misselling Haunts the FSA

The chairman of the House of Commons Treasury Select Committee, Andrew Tyrie is set to demand and explanation for the growing scandal of alleged systematic interest rate swap misselling by high street banks, mainly between 2005 and 2008.

Mr Tyrie said: “I intend to write to the chairman of the FSA for an explanation of how this issue is being handled.”

It is believed that thousands of small and medium businesses (SMEs) have been hit after banks began selling them highly lucrative interest rate swap derivates. The complex hedge products were often attached to a loan as a condition that it be granted, and while the bank collected handsome up-front profits on the sales of the product, their customers were often unwittingly locked into payments far in excess of those they had been led to anticipate.

Not only that, but faced with the burden of these payments, on seeking to escape the unfavourable arrangements they then discovered a levy of unexpected exit fees running in many cases into hundreds of thousands of pounds.

It is estimated that thousands of SME businesses have been affected – and commentators say that the scale of the problem may dwarf even the PPI scandal, running into several billion pounds.

Harvinder McKibbin of Harvey McKibbin Solicitors in Lichfield said: “Lots of SMEs feel compelled to accept the situation they find themselves in for fear their bank will call in the loan if they make a public complaint. However, instead of being saddled with this huge burden of debt they could be entitled to compensation if the product was missold – so I would urge any business in this position to seek legal advice as soon as possible.”

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Controversy in Court

 

The Bar Standards Board, independent regulator of Barristers, has expressed unease with the standard of non-barrister advocates in court.

Baroness Deech, chair of the Board said that research showed “a robust evidence base as to the high level of concern about advocacy competence in criminal courts.”

The research is said to show that solicitors who act as advocates are less skilled than their barrister counterparts.

However, the Law Society’s CEO Des Hutton, representing solicitors, called the research “deeply flawed and self serving.”

The controversy serves to highlight the differences between barristers and solicitors.

In the main, one would tend to use a barrister for court representation, but the traditional route to court would normally have begun in a discussion of the problem with your solicitor for initial advice.

However, the legal landscape is changing and now many barristers chambers are very happy to be approached direct. This often means significant cost savings to clients as a result, because they don’t end up paying legal fees to two parties for overlapping advice.

This “controversy in court” may run for a while, but in the meantime, if you need to talk to a barrister direct then it has become really easy for you to get the help you need right away.

The subject of impending Gay Marriage in the UK, equally sadly and predictably, has seen a lot of ruffled feathers fly and indiscrete, ugly spats and religious dogma explode into the mass media, print and social, says a LichfieldSolicitor.

Possibly the most outrageous comments came from Cardinal Keith O'Brien – the leading man-in-a-dress… I mean, the most senior Catholic in Britain.

Shamefully, O’Brien dubbed gay marriage as "grotesque”, amongst other vile comments. This from an official of an organisation that has presided over some of the most shocking and truly grotesque myriad abuses of position and trust in times recent or past!

In our firm we are privileged and delighted to act for many same sex couples and this solicitor in Lichfield certainly thinks that those who profess that their religion is all about love should do some long, hard looking at themselves before they lob another rock through what’s left of their glass house! 

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