A background blog from 2022 is available here. How the FCA failed those sold Blackmore Bonds . 

It took  strong campaigners to make a difference, congratulations who were strong and have.

Paul Carlier is a strong advocate for transparency, fairness and open dealings with Government authority. He reports on a positive movement at last.

Below is the longer version for the readers of this blog who have claims or who see justice as part of what they want from the regulatory system.

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BREAKING NEWS – FSCS appears to be upholding claims made by Blackmore Bond Series 1 bondholders against the FCA authorised and regulated insurance broker, Lonsdale Insurance Brokers limited

This is HUGE news.

This appears to mean up to £18m invested by more than 800 Blackmore Bond Series 1 bondholders will now likely be repaid by the FSCS!!!!! IMPORTANTLY, this is up to £18m compensation being paid by the FSCS for failings by an FCA authorised and regulated insurance broker who the FCA has never once mentioned in respect to Blackmore Bond!!!

https://www.fscs.org.uk/making-a-claim/failed-firms/lonsdale-insurance/

“FSCS is now open to claims for Lonsdale involving the purchase of series 1 of the bonds issued by Blackmore Bond plc. We understand claims are likely to relate to Lonsdale arranging the Capital Guarantee Scheme for series 1 bondholders. We lack evidence connecting Lonsdale to other tranches of the bonds and have been informed there was no connection. We’re therefore unlikely to be able to uphold claims for Lonsdale from investors who invested in series 2 to 6 of the bonds. Customers are welcome to submit details of their claims for series 1 of the bonds to us, although they will not immediately be passed to our assessment team. This is because we’re completing the final stages of our investigation and we will publish a further update on this by the end of December.”

More importantly internal FCA evidence I have proves that the FCA investigated Lonsdale in 2020, were given substantial smoking gun evidence specific to their role and failings….. and the FCA then airbrushed them out of their investigation altogether. (More on this to follow)

And they did so because this proved they dropped the ball in 2017 when they failed to investigate my smoking gun reports about Blackmore Bond. Instead, LCF trial documents show that in 2017 the FCA abdicated its duty to investigate my reports and those of others to an utterly conflicted FCA authorised and regulated firm, NCM, who had already approved Blackmore Bond marketing material as being fair, clear and not misleading when it was anything but.

Seriously, how does the FCA explain why the FSCS is now going to have to pay up to £18m for the failings of an FCA authorised and regulated firm in respect to Blackmore Bond that the FCA has never mentioned in the 5 years it was investigating???? There MUST be a public inquiry into the FCA’s handling of Blackmore Bond and the shameful dishonesty by the FCA to conceal their prior failings.

In 2022 after the FCA sought to bury everything specific to Blackmore Bond, I took my evidence specific to this bogus insurance and Lonsdale to lawyers who had been instructed by one of the victims.

These lawyers were able to develop that evidence into a ‘representative’ opt-in claim on behalf of more than 500 Series 1 bondholders who opted in.

Lonsdale denied the claim.

The lawyers escalated to the FOS. As soon as the FOS deemed the complaint eligible for the FOS, Lonsdale put themselves into administration. (Don’t get me started on this practise by regulated firms!)

Of course they did.

They knew there was no means of defeating the claim such was the evidence.

The complaint/claim was then transferred to the FSCS in August 2024.

The FSCS has investigated and seen all of the evidence that we have and have presented to them. And today, after 14 months investigation the FSCS have now confirmed they are open to claims against Lonsdale.

I do not believe for one moment that they would be inviting claims unless they were going to be upheld, providing the victims can produce the required evidence. Which they can, because I and the lawyers are making sure the victims have all of the evidence they need. If the claims were not eligible or their investigation concluded that there was not sufficient evidence for any claim to be upheld, they would not have invited Series 1 bondholders to submit a claim, they would have just issued a statement saying no such claim was eligible, possible or would be upheld.

Indeed, I just went through the FSCS process online and they declared that based on the information I provided [which is what all victims can provide]:

‘You can apply for compensation’

It is 8 years and 7 months since I made my first reports to the FCA about Blackmore Bond and the targeting of vulnerable pensioners by them and those who were paid huge sums to market it.

I cannot tell you how satisfying today’s news is. I am so pleased for the victims, most of whom were vulnerable pensioners, including lifelong NHS workers and who have been utterly and catastrophically failed by the FCA.

This has been a pro-bono labour of love for me for more than 8.5 years. I should not have had to spend this much time and effort pursuing justice and compensation for victims. I have been forced to pick up the ball every time they FCA dropped it or tried to bury it.

This is only the beginning. I will not rest until all £46m has been returned to victims.