Chancellor says City can thrive

CHANCELLOR Rishi Sunak has said Brexit gives the UK the chance to take a new path for financial services.

Mr Sunak said yesterday that the nation can now “do things a bit differently” as he pledged to make the City of London “the most attractive place” to list new companies.

The trade treaty brokered with the European Union last Thursday gives little detail on financial services, and EU market access must still be negotiated for British-based firms in specific deals.

Mr Sunak told broadcasters: “Now that we’ve left the European Union, we can do things a bit differently, for example, examining how we make the City of London the most attractive place to list new companies anywhere in the world. But this deal also provides reassurance because there’s a stable, regulatory co-operative framework mentioned in the deal which I think will give people that reassurance that we will remain in close dialogue with our European partners.”

Banks, insurers and other financial firms based in Britain will not be granted automatic access to EU markets from the end of the transition period. They will have to be deemed by Brussels to be governed by rules as robust as within the bloc.