New members appointed to Consumer Panel

The FSA has appointed four new members to the Financial Services Consumer Panel. They are Robert Skinner, Stephen Locke and Adam Phillips who join from 1 March 2004 and Nicolas Lord from 1 January 2005. Additionally, two existing Panel members have had their terms extended Paul Salvidge for three years from 1 January 2004 to 31 December 2006 and Vinod Kumar from 1 January 2004 to 31 December 2005.

Dianne Hayter has been appointed Vice-Chairman of the Panel succeeding Ann Foster who took over as Chairman of the Panel last November.

FSA Chairman Callum McCarthy said:

"I am very pleased that Robert, Stephen, Adam and Nicolas are joining the Panel and that Dianne has taken over as Vice-Chairman. They and the other members will ensure that the Panel continues to act as a strong, independent consumer voice to the FSA."

Biographies

Dianne Hayter is a member of the Board of the National Consumer Council. She was, until early 2004, on the Board of the National Patient Safety Agency. Before that she had periods as the Director of Corporate Affairs of the Wellcome Trust, Chief Executive of the European Parliamentary Labour Party, Director of Alcohol Concern, General Secretary of the Fabian Society, a journalist and trade union research officer. She has been a member of the Consumer Panel since January 2001.

Robert Skinner has been Director General of the Money Advice Trust since April 2003. He was previously UK Personal Sector Director at Barclays plc and Marketing Director at Barclays Private Banking.

Stephen Locke is a National Consumer Council Board member and a member of the Committee of the premium rate communications services regulator ICSTIS. He was previously Director of the Transition Project setting up Ofcom, working on secondment from the Independent Television Committee where he had been Director of Advertising and Sponsorship. Stephen has also worked at a senior level in management consultancy and in the consumer movement, as Director of Research and Policy at the Consumers' Association.

Adam Phillips has extensive experience of market research, including research into consumer financial products. He is Managing Director of Real Research, his own market research consultancy, and is a Council Member of ESOMAR (the world association of market research professionals) also chairing ESOMAR's Professional Standards Committee.

Nicolas Lord is National Head of Money Issues at Citizens Advice and Consultant on Personal Finance to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Ministry of Defence. He is also a Public Interest Director of the Mortgage Code Compliance Board and Public Interest Member of the Finance and Leasing Association Consumer Code Group.

Paul Salvidge is a former senior civil servant with experience of regulatory work, employment law, competition, consumer protection, telecommunications, financial services and company law. He was previously Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs Director at the Department of Trade and Industry. He was appointed to the Panel in October 2000

Vinod Kumar is a social scientist with market research skills and extensive voluntary and public sector experience of policy analysis and research. Until recently, he was Head of Policy and Research at the Royal National Institute for Deaf People, and he has previously worked for the Commission for Racial Equality. Since his retirement, Vinod has been a Non-Executive Director of the Barnet Primary Care Trust, and a member of the Consumer Liaison Group of the Medical Research Council. Currently he is a patient representative on the Research and Advisory Committee of the National Institute for Clinical Excellence, and on the Department of Heath's advisory Committee on Consumer involvement in research. He was appointed to the Panel in October 2000.

Notes for editors

1. The full membership of the Consumer Panel from 1 March 2004 is Ann Foster, Dianne Hayter, Yvonne Gallacher, Harriet Hall, John Howard, Vinod Kumar, Stephen Locke, Nick Pearson, Adam Phillips, Paul Salvidge, Robert Skinner, Richard Smethurst and Dave Watts. Biographical details can be found here.

2. The Financial Services and Markets Act requires the FSA to establish a panel of persons to represent consumers as part of the arrangements it must make for consulting consumers on its general policies and practices. The Financial Services Consumer Panel was established by the FSA in December 1998, ahead of this legislation.

3. The Consumer Panel receives an annual budget and staff support from the FSA but is independent of the FSA in its views.

4. The FSA regulates the financial services industry and has four objectives under the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000: maintaining market confidence; promoting public understanding of the financial system; securing the appropriate degree of protection of consumers; and fighting financial crime.

5. The FSA aims to maintain efficient, orderly and clean financial markets and help retail consumers achieve a fair deal.