the changing regulatory landscape isabel nisbet, acting ceo ([email protected]) 26...
TRANSCRIPT
The Changing Regulatory Landscape
Isabel Nisbet, Acting CEO ([email protected])26 November 2008
Outline
Regulation – the changing scene – Institutionalising the light touch – Self-regulation – a false dawn?– Professionalism – Goodbye to the light touch?– A way forward
Ofqual – the independent regulator of qualifications, exams and tests
Institutionalising the light touch
Nationalised utilities are privatised
Privatised utilities moderated by regulation
Challenge to the traditional professions – Law– Medicine
Reaction to the “regulatory burden” on industry – Better regulation task force (1997)– Hampton principles (2006) – Legislative and Regulatory Reform Act 2006 – Compliance Code 2007
Institutionalising the light touch
ProportionalityInterventions related
to risk Accountability
Consistency• In judgments made
• In data requests• In criteria used
Transparency• Open and visible
Targeting• Measures taken related to purpose
Setting the City free
“The better model of regulation is ... not just a light touch but a limited touch. We should not only apply the concept of risk to the enforcement of
regulation, but to ... the decision as to whether to regulate at all.”
Gordon Brown, 2005
Self-regulation
The universities– 2001: revolt against QAA subject-level inspections
“[John Randall] said that plans for light-touch quality assurance ….. would short-change students and employers and hurt public confidence in university standards…. The Association of University Teachers said “John Randall’s resignation marks the end of overly bureaucratic and prescriptive regulation in higher education”
The professions – Medicine– Nursing – The law– Teaching
Self-regulation (ctd)
Further Education – Sir George Sweeney – Single Voice – Learning and Skills Improvement Service – “Principles of self-
improvement”
The professions
Attempts to champion “professionally-led regulation”
Separation of functions
Overtaken by externally enforced, lay-run, regulation:– Legal Services Act 2007 (Legal Services Board – powers include
setting performance standards and targets; Office for Legal Complaints)
– Health and Social Care Act 2008 (new Office of the Health Professions Adjudicator; appointed GMC Council; “responsible officers” for local doctors)
– Highly critical review of NMC
The new professionalism (public service)
“Excellence and fairness” (Cabinet Office, June 2008)
Includes “professionals defining excellence”
“New professionalism … means maintaining high standards of service and performance, and strengthening user choice and voice, but at the same time providing space for the best pofessionals to design and run their own services.”
The case for joint working
Public interest in the self-respect and ownership of standards by the profession itself
– “The best guarantee of the public safety is the self-respect of the [medical] profession itself” (Merrison)
The reality of professionally-delivered public services – Most professionals are employed by the State and work in the eye
of Government – The “politics of the double bed” (Rudolph Klein)
Earned trust – the social contract
Then it goes badly wrong
More goes wrong
PM vows to prevent Baby P repeat The first pictures of Baby P were revealed on Friday
Gordon Brown has vowed to do everything in his power to prevent a repeat of the Baby P abuse case.
The prime minister rejected Tory claims of "buck-passing" after it emerged that a whistle-blower had raised concerns about Haringey Borough Council.
Baby P's natural father said the process had been "very traumatic", adding: "I loved him deeply."
Baby P died aged 17 months following abuse. His mother and two men were convicted of causing his death.
The alleged failings were investigated by the Commission for Social Care Inspection (CSCI).
The banking crisis
“Few dispute that the whole concept of “laissez-faire” financial regulation has failed. Stephen Green, chairman of HSBC, has described the model as ‘bankrupt’. Even Alan Greenspan, the former US Federal reserve chairman and arch-exponent of the ‘light
touch’ has admitted his ‘world view’ was wrong.” (Daily Telegraph)
What Adair Turner said
“[The crisis] frees one from the danger that one is going to be criticised in that over-sloganised way [“red tape”, “over-regulation”]…. We are now in a different environment. We shouldn’t regulate for regulation’s sake but over-regulation and red tape has been used as a polemical bludgeon. We have probably been over-deferential to that rhetoric.”
So whither risk-based/principles-based regulation?
A way forward
Principles can be tough
“There’s nothing light or soft about the use of principles. Indeed, I’d remind anyone so misguided as to believe that principles are less demanding than rules, that principles confer flexibility on the regulator” (Callum McCarthy, former Chair of FSA)
Set and police firm boundaries
Drilling down is okay – but must be justified
Risk regimes can be high as well as low
Learn how to learn from crises
Primary, secondary and tertiary prevention
Mix and match from the repertoire of regulatory instruments
Christopher Hood’s four types of control
Contrived randomness Oversight
Competition Mutuality
A way forward
Principles can be tough
“There’s nothing light or soft about the use of principles. Indeed, I’d remind anyone so misguided as to believe that principles are less demanding than rules, that principles confer flexibility on the regulator” (Callum McCarthy, former Chair of FSA)
Set and police firm boundaries Drilling down is okay – but must be justified Risk regimes can be high as well as low Learn how to learn from crises Primary, secondary and tertiary prevention Mix and match from the repertoire of regulatory instruments Loose-tight controls (Peters & Waterman)
About Ofqual
Independent of Government and QCA– Will report to Parliament
To ensure standards and confidence in qualifications, exams and tests
Conceived by Ed Balls in September 07
Launched (in shadow form) in April 08
Legislation in 08-09 session
Meantime distinct part of QCA
Our mission as a regulator
Regulate awarding bodies, qualifications, examinations and National Curriculum Assessments effectively to ensure that the qualifications market is fit for purpose, that qualifications are fair, that standards are secure, that public confidence is sustained, and that Ofqual acts as the public champion of the learner.
Ofqual’s strategic priorities for 2008-09
Maintain standards in existing, new and revised qualifications and assessments
Recognise Professional Bodies that are fit to be in the national system and make sure that they are effective
Secure an effective and efficient qualifications market
Act in the public interest when things go wrong
Promote and sustain confidence in the regulated system
Establish and run an effective and visibly independent interim regulator, within QCA
The Reliability Project
How much variability in results is acceptable? – Same learner on different occasions – Different markers
Are our expectations realistic?
Technical strand
Public debate
Conclusions
Challenge to regulatory orthodoxy
Need for VERSATILE REGULATION
Regulators and professionals should work together
OFQUAL – independent regulator of qualifications, exams and tests
Shining a light on the public debate
Intelligent crisis management