On 19 May 2026, the Financial Services and Markets Bill completed its first reading in the House of Lords.
The Bill was referred to in the briefing notes of the King’s Speech as the Enhancing Financial Services Bill.
The Bill will:
- Modernise consumer protections and redress arrangements to reflect today’s markets and maintain confidence.
- Consolidate the regulatory framework to enable stronger coordination and clearer responsibilities, reduce fragmentation of the regulators and support innovation.
- Ensure that the administrative burden on firms is proportionate without compromising on core consumer, prudential and market protections.
- Enable credit unions to expand by improving the rules on who can become a member.
- Support lending and investment including by updating the statutory framework underpinning the ring-fencing regime, which requires major banks to separate their UK retail banking services from investment banking activities.
- Modernising oversight of anti‑money laundering and counter‑terrorist financing.
- Ensuring access to in-person banking services for the future.