Professor Philip Lane:

Let me make a few points about that. Around the world there are all sorts of different institutional arrangements but let me emphasise that there are a lot of advantages to having consumer protection within the Central Bank. It is important to emphasise that there is no hierarchy in the legislation. It is not the case that consumer protection ranks below financial stability. These are twin mandates that we have. I remind the Deputy that our financial regulation activity is funded by fees collected from the industry and that there is not a resource constraint here. If we deem it necessary to expand our personnel to deliver consumer protection, by and large that cost will fall on the industry; it will not fall on the taxpayer. We have advocated throughout that the cost should be fully paid for by the industry.

An advantage of consumer protection within the bank is that we learn a great deal from being the overall supervisor. Around the world, stand-alone consumer protection commissions have a difficulty because they do not have the same access to information that we have. I would think that it is in the best interests of consumers that we have that twin power. It is quite effective. We have done a lot that is at the intersection of supervision and consumer protection. Our codes have been, unusually in the international context, prescriptive in how financial institutions deal with consumers. There is always an uphill struggle to do more and do better, but it is not an issue of resources or of any conflict within the Central Bank.