I trust that you all had fine weekends and that none of them involved mass barbecues in Brockley Park.  Perhaps Sadiq Khan can finally find a use for those water cannon that the current Prime minister left behind for him…

 

Some More Coronavirus Requirements

 

FCA has published some further guidance on some relaxation of the Senior Managers & Certification Regime during the current circumstance.  This allows you to cover for any Senior Manager that falls sick with limited need to notify FCA – although you should document what is going on internally.

 

Information CASS-cade

 

Even hotter off the FCA press is some guidance around the client money rules.  This picks up on the point we raised on your behalf on the situation where clients pay by cheque – and your options for funding the payment so the client is not disadvantaged by not being on cover.  Also some useful information on the impact on client money audits.

 

PPL-easing signs

 

Further to our heartfelt pleas for you to avoid trading via email at all costs, it is pleasing to be able to report that March 31st was a new record day for volumes of trades on the PPL platform.  The number of users and training courses requested are also up.  As are submissions put onto the platform.  And feedback from members using this area of the system is that the response time of carriers is very good.  So rather than initiate a deal using another medium and transfer to PPL at firm order, why not use the platform all the way through?  It does seem to work…

 

Hair today

 

The weekend also saw the low key investiture of Keir “don’t call me Sir” Starmer as leader of the Labour party.  This brings with it the intriguing juxtaposition of a man with one of the most highly sculptured hairstyles of recent political times facing off across the dispatch box against a man from the opposite coiffurian pole.  That is one hopes that the Prime Minister recovers and returns to work from hospital.  And I say this not just from the human level.  Because, let’s face it, whilst the nation’s fate may be dicey at the moment, if Dim Dom takes over we are definitely doomed.

 

However, I have a concern with the new leader of the opposition.  From the looks of him when he appeared on various television stations yesterday, the man has clearly been sunbathing.  Which may make him a suitable candidate to be Chief Medical Officer for Scotland but ought to disqualify him from front line politics.

 

 

Y esta el fin.  Monday night is virtual Spanish night here.  Hasta manana