How UK Regulators Became Silent Partners in a Decade of Pension Fraud

Why the FSCS, FCA, and Action Fraud must face public scrutiny for their failure to protect the people they serve

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For more than a decade, pension savers have been quietly robbed—of money, of trust, and of justice. Yet, the regulators charged with safeguarding them have not only failed to stop the fraud, they’ve arguably enabled it.

At the centre of this scandal lie three organisations: the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS), and Action Fraud, each of whom has become a cog in a system that too often protects perpetrators more than victims.

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🧱 FSCS: A Safety Net Turned Subsidy

The FSCS was designed to protect consumers from regulated firm failures. But in the case of Hartley Pensions and others, the FSCS has become a financial mop, cleaning up messes created by serial bad actors while failing to challenge the structures that enabled the damage.

• Over £300 million in compensation has already been paid relating to Hartley and the failed SIPPs it absorbed—funded not by the fraudsters but by levies on law-abiding firms.
• FSCS funded Hartley’s second collapse with a further £40 million, despite known governance concerns.
• Lawyers representing FSCS—previously Bevan Brittan, now Dentons—have been accused of prolonging damage by defending the indefensible, with no apparent appetite to pursue stolen assets or recover taxpayer money.

Rather than acting as a disincentive to wrongdoing, the FSCS risks becoming a blank cheque for repeat failures, underwriting long-term fraud while keeping the public in the dark.

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⚖️ FCA: Regulator or Rebranded Bystander?

Though often referred to as the successor to the Financial Services Authority (FSA), the FCA is the same legal entity, merely rebranded in 2012. This distinction matters: if the liabilities and obligations of the FSA persist, then so too might the duty to redress longstanding regulatory failings.

But instead of accountability, we see evasion:

• The FCA has consistently licensed firms and individuals who later presided over catastrophic pension losses.
• It has ignored whistleblowers, refused correspondence, and dismissed credible reports of systemic misconduct.
• Victims say FCA correspondence is scripted, dismissive, and increasingly outsourced, eroding trust in any meaningful oversight.

At best, the FCA has mismanaged oversight. At worst, it has become a protector of institutional reputation over consumer protection.

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🚔 Action Fraud: The Illusion of Justice

The public portal for reporting financial crime has become little more than an automated filter.

• Victims routinely receive templated dismissals, even in cases later validated by the FCA or foreign regulators.
• It’s alleged that fraud under £10,000 is routinely ignored, and that Action Fraud is intentionally structured to avoid collecting usable evidence.
• Whistleblowers report that victims pursuing justice after Action Fraud’s refusal are at risk of being labelled vexatious—a Kafkaesque twist in an already broken system.

This is not a fraud reporting mechanism. It is a bureaucratic firewall, shielding authorities from responsibility.

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🧩 A System Designed to Fail Victims

The result of these failings is a landscape where:

• Pensioners lose homes, savings, and livelihoods.
• Legal avenues are prohibitively expensive or structurally blocked.
• Government-backed institutions quietly admit liability only after prolonged denial, delay, and damage.

Commercial law firms are paid to defend regulatory silence. Institutions close ranks. And those affected are told to move on.

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🗣️ It’s Time to End the Silence

We cannot afford to let this cycle continue.

It’s time to:

• Demand an independent public inquiry into the FSCS’s role in underwriting pension fraud.
• Reassess the FCA’s continuity of liability from the FSA era under the Companies Act.
• Abolish Action Fraud in its current form and replace it with a genuine fraud investigation unit, open to whistleblower collaboration.
• Provide legal aid or a dedicated advocacy body (such as our proposed Get SAFE charity) to represent victims of large-scale financial crime.

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✊ Standing Together

This article is not just an indictment of systemic failure—it’s a rallying cry. To every victim dismissed, every whistleblower ignored, and every regulator that turned a blind eye, the message is clear:

We see you. We hear you. And we will not stop until justice is done.

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