A chairman of the UK's FCA has been accused of breaching confidentiality by sharing unredacted whistleblower information, violating FCA policy.

The chair of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is reported to have forwarded emails in December 2023 and March 2024 that contained the complainant’s unredacted name, address, and concerns. The FCA’s whistleblowing policy states, ‘Your identity will not be revealed without your consent.’ The whistleblower, who was dismissed from the regulator in 2021 for alleged misconduct and lost an employment tribunal case (which they are appealing), raised concerns about allegedly opaque hiring practices, leading to an internal review.

The FCA has also initiated a second internal audit in response to the whistleblower’s correspondence, which will scrutinise the watchdog’s process for deciding whether allegations of misconduct should be formally internally investigated.

FCA criticised for handling whistleblower cases

The regulator has already drawn criticism over its handling of whistleblowers. In 2023, the Information Commissioner’s Office ruled that the FCA had breached its data protection obligations. The Times reported that the case involved the FCA allegedly intercepting and diverting staff correspondence, including confidential whistleblowing emails, to keep track of people it considered a nuisance.

In a separate case in 2018, the Financial Regulators Complaints Commissioner slammed the FCA for revealing the identity of a Royal Bank of...

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