Britain’s Financial Services Authority is well on its way to cutting in half the time it takes to carry out investigations, FSA chief executive John Tiner says.

In a speech at its annual enforcement conference on Monday, Tiner said the FSA has already cut average investigation times down from slightly more than 16 months to slightly more than 11 months. As a result of a review commissioned last year of its enforcement referral, investigation and decision-making process, it expects to shave off another 30%.

“If we achieve this we will have more than halved the average investigation time over a three-to-four-year period,” he said. “It is often said that justice delayed is justice denied, and I am clear that we have a responsibility to both firms and consumers to be as speedy and as effective as possible in our enforcement work.”

Tiner said that the changes it is making fall into six categories: simplifying documentation, streamlining decision making, improving project management methodology and use of technology, better planning of investigations and formal interviews, encouraging earlier settlement of cases and more flexible use of preliminary findings letters.

“I think this last point illustrates the general theme of the end to end review; which is that we need to be flexible in our approach and our enforcement staff need to think creatively about how best to conduct an investigation — of course ensuring they are conducted fairly and properly,” he said.

Tiner also said the FSA is considering whether to change its policy on publicizing investigations. Generally, it doesn’t do so unless it believes it’s absolutely necessary to secure market confidence or to protect consumers. A similar policy is followed by most major regulators, including the Ontario Securities Commission.

“We have a general preference for greater transparency about the cases we are investigating. But this must be done in a way which does not affect market confidence and does not unfairly damage firms or individuals,” he said. “If we decide to increase the publicity given to our investigations, we also need to consider when is the right moment to make an announcement.”

Tiner said that the FSA is taking on fewer cases. During the past four years, it has cut its load from 600 cases in 2000 to 350 cases in 2002 and an estimated 170 cases this year. “We are now resolving many more issues through day-to-day supervisory discussion and action rather than enforcement. We are selecting cases for enforcement which are either the most egregious or where we believe it is important to send messages to a particular sector or to the market as a whole,” he noted.