Treasury Committee advisers to scrutinise FCA report on RBS

One month after refusing to publish the skilled persons' report into the treatment of the Royal Bank of Scotland's Global Restructuring Group customers, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) agreed to allow the Treasury Committee to scrutinise its contents.

Under pressure from Treasury Committee leader Nicky Morgan, Andrew Bailey, the FCA's chief executive, on Tuesday agreed to an arrangement that would see Andrew Green QC, a legal adviser appointed by the committee, compare that FCA's forthcoming summary against the underlying report on activities at GRG.

Morgan, who had written to Bailey on multiple occasions in an effort to get the watchdog to release the report - originally slated for release in 2015 - said on Tuesday that advisers would start work immediately with the intention of reporting back to the committee before Bailey's appearance before the Treasury at the end of October.

Morgan said, "If the advisers' report does not provide the committee with the assurances it needs, it will decide whether any further steps are required."

"There is no good reason for the committee's review to delay the FCA from publishing its summary as soon as possible," she added.

GRG, a now defunct division of RBS, was a business support unit for troubled businesses that looked after more than 12,000 British companies between 2007 and 2012 and was accused of artificially distressing otherwise viable business and putting the businesses on a path towards administration, receivership and inevitably – liquidation.

The Treasury Committee stated that it would publish the advisers' report in full at the earliest opportunity, making it available to the FCA at the same time as the public.