Equitable Life
Letter from the Parliamentary Ombudsman

Dear Member,

I wrote to you recently enclosing a note explaining my position regarding the above in the light of the announcement of Lord Penrose's inquiry. At that point I had decided to await the outcome of the inquiry before considering further whether I might usefully intervene.

Since then, the Financial Services Authority's report on their involvement in the regulation of Equitable Life from 1 January 1999 to 8 December 2000 has been published (HC 244). Having considered the contents of that report, I propose to conduct a statuary investigation into the Authority's actions on behalf of the Treasury during that period, with a view to establishing whether individuals have suffered injustice as a consequence of maladministration. Accordingly, I am this week issuing to the Treasury a formal statement of complaint, to which I shall invite them to respond. Subject to any comments that the Treasury may make in response, my staff will begin the investigation. It is difficult to predict how long that will take. While I aim to complete the investigation and issue a report as soon as I can, you may wish to note that investigations by my Office are currently being completed in an average of 43 weeks, and I would expect, given the complexity of the matters involved, that this may take longer than the average to conclude. I must therefore ask you and your constituents to be patient.

I remain conscious of the need to avoid understandable overlap with the work being done by Lord Penrose. I intend to liase with Lord Penrose to see what can be done to avoid that as far as possible.

I will write to you again when my investigation is complete.

Yours sincerely,

Michael Buckley
Commissioner