Britain criticises banks, regulator over slow mis-selling payouts

LONDON, Oct 24 (Reuters) - Britain's financial regulator andbig banks need to "get on with the job" of compensating smallbusinesses who were victims of a large-scale financialmis-selling scandal, the government said on Thursday.

As business owners who were mis-sold complex interest rateproducts gathered to protest outside parliament, lawmakersagreed that the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) had acted tooslowly and banks had paid out too little of the 3 billion pounds($4.9 billion) they have set aside for compensation.

"The FCA and banks need to get on with the job," said SajidJavid, the government minister in charge of relations with thefinancial service industry. "The lack of progress of the redressscheme is too slow, this is costly and it has caused furtherundue distress to businesses involved."

The comments came at the end of a three-hour debate in whichmany lawmakers gave accounts of constituents affected by thescandal. Lawmakers unanimously backed a symbolic motioncriticising the compensation process.

A review of mis-selling cases, in which businesses wereoften sold protection against an interest rate rise without fullknowledge of the risks, has taken longer than expected, leavingsome paying high charges and forcing others out of business.

So far only 2 million pounds in compensation has been paidout.

Earlier this week banks Lloyds, Royal Bank ofScotland and Barclays joined HSBC incommitting to speed up compensation, while the head of the FCA,Martin Wheatley, also backed faster action.