Recent news

This submission presents a potential transformation of the consumer protection landscape. 

Beware of an increasing number of scammers contacting Northern Rock shareholders.

The firms state they are financial services, consultancy services and legal organisations. They require their targets to sign a non-disclosure agreement. Some are saying that they are doing this on behalf of Virgin Money UK. 

Sue Milton, External Relations Director, has contacted Virgin Money, the bank that bought Northern Rock in January 2012.  Virgin Money has confirmed they are not doing anything with Northern Rock and these firms are not acting on behalf of Virgin Money.

UKSA's submission to the Inquiry conducted by the UK Parliament's Education Committee has now been published.

UKSA expresses its disappointment in the government’s dismal performance on restoring trust in audit and governance in its response to the FRC’s draft budget and plan 2024-25 for consultation.

The FRC published its draft budget and plan 2024-25 for consultation on 15th December 2023 and we responded on 22nd January 2024.

We made four points:

In response to an ‘Inquiry into strengthening Financial Education’ UKSA presented new ideas to address the UK population’s weakness in financial literacy.

Who is responsible for an organisation’s non compliance with laws and regulations? We have replied to the FRC’s consultation to point out that the revised ISA (UK) 250 needs to be very clear on this – it’s the organisation’s management, not the auditor

We had asked for the meeting to express concerns at the direction of the Taskforce’s Interim Report expressed in our formal response.

We are aware that many Northern Rock shareholders are being targeted via scams to purchase their shares. The scammers are very good at mimicking genuine companies to gain your trust. You can read more about this type of scam on the FCA website here. 

Board focus will be forced to change and, at last, boards will be unable to escape responsibility for internal control, assurance and resilience.

But surely directors should be taking responsibility for these already.  If not, why not? 

Small but significant adjustments to the UK’s Code of Corporate Governance it will mean a big win for shareholders.

UKSA has responded to the interim report of the Digitisation Taskforce. The report is a big step forward, and UKSA has replied extensively to the questions asked. But it fails to confront the systemic weaknesses that often force individual investors to abdicate their ownership responsibilities in favour of intermediaries.