The chairman of the Financial Services Authority (FSA) has defended the current system of regulatory fees and levies for small firms, arguing they are proportionate to the size of the firm.
With a number of failures to deal with recently, Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) levies have increased significantly over the past few years, in some cases more than doubling for IFA firms in the latest invoice.
Speaking after the FSA's annual public meeting yesterday, Lord Turner insisted the levies did not treat small firms unfairly.
"It is appropriate that FSCS levies fall in a proportionate way across the industry and they are fairly precisely determined by certain metrics of revenue or assets, so [they are] already fully proportionate with the size of the firm," he said.
Meanwhile, he also explained how the FSA had worked to make its own regulatory fees fairer on small firms.
"We've put a lot of thought over the last three years into where the costs are being generated in terms of the activities we need to perform and that's been reflected by increasing our fees against the very largest banks and insurance companies," he said.
"We have actually frozen the charges for the smallest firms for a number of years and some even received decreases this year."
For 2012/13, firms in the A13 advisory block, which includes financial advisers, are paying £37.1m to fund the FSA, a reduction of 6.8% from the previous year.
Following the recent record £59.5m fine handed to Barclays for its LIBOR manipulation, the Treasury announced it may divert the money to help taxpayers rather than back to the industry to rebate other banks' levies.
Turner yesterday said he was "perfectly happy", detailing how the FSA itself had previously recommended using the fines to fund personal financial education.
