Ms Stella Creasy
MP for Walthamstow · Labour (Co-op) · United Kingdom
“I thank the Foreign Secretary for his clear-sighted commitment not only to talk about a two-state solution, but to actually try to act to achieve it, as the only foundation of a safe Israel and a free Palestine.”
“Could he reassure the House that we will not acquiesce and bend to such pressure, and that the only action that could ever be acceptable to us to make us contemplate reversing this ban would be a halt on the E1 development and a permanent end to settler violence?”
“I start by paying tribute to the new Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green (Florence Eshalomi), for all the work she did on the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee on these issues. I know that she will do a brilliant job in this role.”
“I do not really understand the technology, but I know that he does, and I understand and share his fear accordingly. We come here today to debate this Bill because we all know that trust is a bygone issue in our politics.”
“We would welcome her having that conversation, which might be more illuminating than whether she is concerned about Zach Goldmsith’s leaflets. I add my support to the amendments tabled by my hon.”
“From today, if we do not take a stand with this Bill to tackle the ways that money has infiltrated our politics, the risk is that they will think we are acting in the interests of our own back pockets.”
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“I urge Government Members who recognise the debt held in their communities and understand that this measure will make it worse not better, to think again and to work with us on when and how these changes come in and how we can make sure everyone benefits from a higher wage, higher productivity economy. I promise them that the families in trouble who are coming to them now need and deserve nothing less.”
“Labour Members would make different choices and put first those people for whom £10,000 of unsecured personal debt means not only suffering the indignity of going to a food bank or going hungry every day, but that they cannot make long-term choices for their family’s future, or even entertain the idea of getting on the housing ladder. They will not be able to pay the social care costs that the hon. Member for Erewash spoke about, or let their children go into further or higher education, because they simply cannot afford it. We see the potential that will be wasted as a result. We want to make choices that will help those families, help the economy to be more productive, and help this country truly to bounce back, but that is not the choice being made by the Government tonight.”
“The Chancellor made great play of putting capital gains tax on the sale of commercial property, but he left open a loophole for residential property. Were the Government to close that gap, none of these changes would need to take place. Debt is a problem in itself. This Government are paying out £10 billion in public finance initiative debt repayments. Were they to get serious about renegotiating PFI debt—they would receive support for that from those on the Opposition Benches—we could save that money. The speech by the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire was powerful because there are always choices to be made.”
“When interest rates rise—and they will—a 2% increase will lead to an extra £1,000 a year in interest payments alone that families will have to find. Families in other constituencies might have £1,000 hanging around, but not those in my constituency. With one third of people in this country having no savings at all, the changes as they stand will eat not into people’s savings or borrowings, but into their debt. That is the consequence we are facing and we need alternative ways to deal with that. Let me offer some alternative ideas for how we could cut the cake and reduce this country’s debt. The Government could make changes to inheritance tax, although I recognise that Conservative Members do not like that idea. Alternatively, let us look at capital gains tax.”
“I beg the hon. Lady to read research from the independent Institute for Fiscal Studies that shows that none of those changes will compensate for the difference in income. I ask her to look into her heart and consider whether families in her constituency will end up borrowing because they find that there is even more month at the end of their money as a result of these changes and the way they are being introduced. I understand the point raised by the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe but there are alternative choices. We all want the deficit to go down—some of us do not want to see Governments borrowing from banks anymore—and we recognise the problems in our economy. Some of us are deeply concerned about the consequences for families of having that level of personal debt hanging over their heads.”
“I add my support for Quaker Social Action and the work it has done on the matter. My hon. Friend is making a point about the people’s ability to plan funerals. Does she agree that we have to be very sensitive to communities when the speed at which someone is buried comes into play in being able to plan and cost accordingly, and to some of the risks that creates for those communities?”
“I join others in congratulating my hon. Friend on securing this very important debate. Will he join me in putting on the record his thanks for the work done by Women for Refugee Women to uncover some of these problems in Yarl’s Wood—often against blanket denials from the Home Office that these problems are happening?”
“The hon. Gentleman and I have shared a platform before to express our concerns about Yarl’s Wood. The fact that two thirds of the women in Yarl’s Wood are released back into the community demonstrates the futility of that place. Does he agree that it is time to move on and close it down?”
“The hon. Gentleman’s argument seems to be predicated on the idea that the fact that Australia has said no to boatloads of people has had the effect of stopping people going. Is he aware of the number of people who are continuing to drown while trying to get to Australia? Is there not just a vague possibility that the boats are not a pull factor, and that it is the need to flee for their lives that is making people take this risk? Operation Mare Nostrum was stopped in the Mediterranean because there was an idea that doing so would somehow stop people coming, but that simply was not true. People are dying and fighting for their lives; surely they deserve our protection.”
“It is sobering to realise that one in every 122 people in the world is a refugee, internally displaced or seeking asylum. The hon. Member for Gravesham (Mr Holloway) might be surprised to learn that they are not just coming from Syria. People face political persecution in Pakistan and in Iran. Those coming to us today from Syria, Lebanon, Sudan, Eritrea, Somalia, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe are not a new phenomenon—the Huguenots, the Jews, the Ugandan Asians, the Vietnamese boat people and the Kosovans came before them. Every generation faces those who meet the test of being people who are “outside their country and cannot return owing to a well-founded fear of persecution”.”
“When people are fleeing the repressive regime of Robert Mugabe, will you help? Yes. When people are fleeing civil war in Sudan and Eritrea, will you help? Yes. How we answer says as much about us as it does about them, so when we quibble about numbers and qualify them by saying that we will take 20,000 but over a number of years, or perhaps that we will take not 20,000 but up to 20,000—”
“The hon. Gentleman raises the point about the well-founded fear, but my point is that every generation faces the test that the 1951 convention sets us. When a person comes to us and says, “I am in danger, will you help me?”, how we answer defines us as much as it defines their future. As the hon. Member for Gravesham said, it is a moral question. When we signed the convention in 1951, nobody could have predicted the situation that we are in now, but the fact that we could not predict it does not absolve us of the responsibility to answer the question. We are not absolved when the people fleeing the murderous intent of ISIL ask, “Will you help?” Our answer should be yes. When people are fleeing sexual violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo, will you help? Yes.”
“I shall come on to talk about Walthamstow and am happy to invite the hon. Gentleman, who need not come under cover, to see the welcome that we give to people in Walthamstow. It is not easy, but we do it because it says something about us as a country and a community that when people are at risk we answer the call. When the people of Germany have answered the call to the tune of 800,000, when the people of Sweden have answered the call by taking eight per 1,000 of population, that challenges us all in the UK. Let us look at the camps, because the Government are specifying that we should take people from the camps alone. When we consider the figure of 800,000 taken by Germany, it is sobering to realise that Lebanon has taken more than 1.1 million people in a country of 4.5 million.”
“Let us not make it an either-or with our European neighbours; let us help all those people. If we want to stop the boats and lorries, that is what we must do. I want to make a final plea to the Home Secretary. Save the Children is putting out a charity single that has been set up by Caitlin Moran, Pete Paphides and Mat Whitecross. Will the Home Secretary please join me in calling for the VAT on that charity single to be waived so that the money can be used to help the refugees? The single is called “Help is Coming”. Let that be the message that comes from the House of Commons today, not the quibbling, quantifying and denying. Let us send the message that help really is coming.”
“There is no speech we can make here, no threat we can make to those boats and no lesson we can learn from Australia that will override the enduring wish of every parent to give their child that kind of future. If we do not hear those voices, the question is not about them; it is about us. The problem is not refugees or migrants; the problem is politicians not doing their job. It is our job to ensure that the benefits of migration are equally distributed in this country. It is our job to ensure that we help those people who are fleeing persecution, and that is what we should do. Let us not be the problem; let us be the solution. If we can take 20,000 and there are 20,000 now, let us take the 20,000 now. Let us not quibble or qualify that; let us take them now. The Government accept that we can house these people, so let us do it now.”
“Think of the men who might fail school exams or lose jobs and who we will not give visas to—men like Einstein, or the father of Steve Jobs. The people fleeing persecution have so much to contribute to our world, so when we answer the question “Will you help?” with a yes, we do everybody a benefit. Think of the doctors, engineers, writers and lawyers currently in those camps. It is not the thought of life in Britain that is the pull factor. It is not the £35 a week we give people. It is not the misery of dealing with UK Border Force, or the threat that even if you are a victim of sexual violence we will lock you up in Yarl’s Wood. The pull factor is staying alive. The pull factor is being able to give your children the possibility of adolescence. That is why people are making that choice.”
“I know that it is a hard question to answer when the voices of the persecuted are sometimes quiet and vulnerable, by comparison with the other voices we hear, such as the headlines that say, “Halt the asylum tide now”, “Draw a red line under immigration or else” or “The swarm on our streets”, or calls for deployment of the Army against the people that the hon. Member for Gravesham (Mr Holloway) has accepted may well be fleeing persecution. It is hard to hear their voices. We should also understand the consequences of not hearing their voices. We cut the funding for Operation Mare Nostrum, thinking that somehow that would stop the boats. The boats came anyway, and the lorries are still running. Let us think about the people whose lives we have not been able to save, and of the contribution that they would have made to our world.”
“I am sorry, but I have taken a number of interventions. Turkey has taken 1.9 million people. If we think that taking 20,000 over five years is big, we do not understand our own history or the scale of the challenge. The UK has taken just 1% of the world’s refugees. What does that say about us? I know that answering that question is not easy, because we have answered it in Walthamstow. It is not an easy challenge to accept people and be able to integrate them. I am proud of the way that people in Walthamstow have responded to the situation in Calais. Many have gone there themselves with goods to help support people and show their solidarity. I am proud that that is not a one-off—we have set up our own migrant welcoming centre. Walthamstow means welcome; it is what we do in my community.”
“We agree with the Minister that these are technical issues, but passengers—including me over the summer and many of our constituents—who find themselves waiting for delayed trains or in overcrowded carriages, unable to get a seat, should expect clarity from us on their rights and how they can exercise them. There is a risk that the order will not give them the same protection that they receive in other parts of their lives, and I am sure we would all agree that that is not the intention. I look forward to the Minister’s response.”
“Therefore, as a passenger, I will not get the protection that this SI offers me in other areas of my life. Does the Minister agree that passengers deserve a better system of compensation for a poor standard of rail services, and that it is a priority for him and his Department to resolve the conflict that the statutory instrument will create whereby those consumers will not be afforded the protection of a market-wide study into that area, which they would get in other areas? If he does not agree, will he explain why he thinks the compensation systems that passengers can currently access are acceptable, even though there is a conflict with the Consumer Rights Act? Given that he wrote to us to say that there would be a delay, when does he expect passengers to get the decent right of return we are talking about?”
“Under the Consumer Rights Act, I would be entitled to a refund, but the national conditions of carriage allow for the train company to give me a train voucher, which means that I have another ticket for the train company that cannot run a train on time. Were I to be sold a faulty good or service in another part of my life, I could ask for the equivalent of my money back or a refund under the new Consumer Rights Act, but because the Government have excluded passengers from the legislation and are delaying the point at which that conflict might be resolved, the powers to be enacted by this statutory instrument will not allow the Competition and Markets Authority to look at why passengers get such a raw deal when it comes to compensation.”
“The Opposition are particularly concerned about the levels of compensation offered to consumers when their rail journeys are delayed or they receive a poor service, such as when disabled passengers cannot get on to trains because of poor quality provision and people experience a range of refund systems with different train companies when their services are delayed. There is strong evidence that the number of complaints about rail passenger services is going through the roof. Surely that is a good indication that it would be right to take a look at the whole market and the ways in which different train companies respond. As part of the campaigning I have been doing, I had a delayed train journey and found that I got a different type of refund—a train voucher—rather than my money back.”
“Therefore, in the context of this statutory instrument, they are excluded from the provision that allows for a market-wide survey to be carried out if there is concern that the collective interest is being breached. What does that mean in layman’s terms? If we thought that passengers were being ripped off, the Competition and Markets Authority could not investigate, and neither could the Office of Rail Regulation. Why does that matter? I am sure that all of us here have had complaints from people about services, and rail services and planes in particular, but if this statutory instrument is enacted as it stands, those consumers will not have the same rights. Will the Minister tell us how he sees that conflict being resolved?”
“When that legislation was being drafted, we had a severe concern that particular types of consumers were being excluded from it, in particular air and rail passengers. At the time, the Minister in charge of the Bill told us that we should raise those concerns on this very statutory instrument if equivalent powers were not provided under the national conditions of carriage legislation. It was therefore with a little sadness that I noted that the Minister wrote to us on 29 July to say that, contrary to the assurances given to us during that legislative process that equal rights to a reasonable service, within a reasonable timescale and at a reasonable price would be translated to passengers as well as other consumers, that was not to be applied and passengers were to be excluded.”
“Given the cross-party agreement that we needed to tackle ticket touting, perish the thought that what he is now introducing is a dog without teeth. The second statutory instrument deals with the Enterprise Act 2002, and we have some more substantial concerns about that. I am sure the Minister will remember the detailed conversations we had with one of his predecessors about that Act—in particular, about how we ensure that all consumers are protected equally. The Consumer Rights Act seeks to simplify the ways in which people can use their rights and responsibilities. It draws on the idea that if someone understands their rights in one sector, they will be able to apply them across all sectors.”
“What does that mean for the review of ticket touting that the Government promised within a year of the legislation being enacted? I am concerned to read in the explanatory memorandum that no impact assessment has been made of the information-sharing powers. If one of the concerns that the ticketing and entertainment industries had about the powers was about the impact of the legislation on their ability to deal with requirements for tickets effectively, then surely such information sharing would have an impact. Surely the Minister would expect enforcement agencies to be able to use that information to identify those ripping off consumers and that would have an impact—hopefully a positive one. I would therefore be interested to hear why no impact assessment has been made.”
“The Minister committed to a review of the secondary market as part of the legislation. That legislation was passed in March and there was a commitment that the review would happen within a year. We are yet to hear when the review will happen and what issues it will cover. One of the Minister’s colleagues in another Department suggested that ticket prices should be set by supply and demand, under secondary ticket touting. As I am sure the Minister is aware, the concern has always been that there was not a fair supply of tickets within the ticket touting industry, and that was causing the problem for consumers. How does the Minister think information-sharing powers will help to tackle the issues around ticket touting and to identify people who are ripping off consumers?”
“Chapter 5 of part 3 of the Consumer Rights Act is enacted by this order. Therefore, it would be helpful to hear a little more from the Minister about how the Act will be made real. Having talked to a number of organisations campaigning against ticket touting and affected by the industry, I am concerned to note that they have yet to receive any guidance from the Minister as to the pursuance of this statutory instrument. As the Minister said, the Consumer Rights Act will come into force in a couple of weeks’ time. This order contains requirements about information sharing, but it does not set out what information should be shared or the powers that enforcement agencies will have to address such issues. For this side of the Committee, this fits into a wider point.”
“A number of Members from across the House debated and raised concerns about ticket touting—particularly about the links between ticket touting and organised crime—and the number of people being ripped off by touts. Therefore, it was welcome that the Government eventually gave in and put measures in the Consumer Rights Act to try to address the challenge of ticket touting. This order looks at one of the provisions around the enforcement powers, particularly information sharing for public agencies. Members who were in the House during the previous Parliament will recall that a lot of our debates were about the lack of information that made ticket touting possible—the opaqueness about what was being sold and the difficulties faced by enforcement agencies in being able to pursue those selling tickets and ripping off consumers.”
“With that in mind, let me offer the Committee the Opposition’s take on these two orders. We do not oppose them, but we have some questions. It would be helpful if the Minister looked into them and gave us some explanation, given the debates we had in the previous Parliament. I am sure that he read all the Consumers Rights Public Bill Committee discussions in detail; dare I say that that will be his “Mastermind” test for today? The draft Consumer Rights Act 2015 (Consequential Amendments) Order 2015 deals with the sharing of enforcement powers. As the Minister acknowledged, it covers the legislation on ticket touting. No Member here can fail to be aware of just how strong the debates about ticket touting were.”
“May I start, Mr Hamilton, by echoing the Minister’s comments—not, alas, about brevity, but about serving under your chairmanship? It is the first time for me, but I hope it will not be the last. I hope that all members of the Committee have come back from their holidays refreshed and raring to go. Unlike the Minister, I am excited by the opportunity to debate consumer rights legislation, having devoted a considerable amount of time to it during the last Parliament—dare I say that my application to “Mastermind” with this as a specialist subject is in train? I can see that nobody else here had the pleasure of serving on the Consumer Rights Public Bill Committee and debating at such length the exciting subject of our rights and responsibilities under consumer legislation.”
“Being able to share information in that way is quite a substantial change, so why—I did ask this previously—has no impact assessment been made for this order?”
“Before the Minister moves on, the draft Consumer Rights Act 2015 (Consequential Amendments) Order 2015 refers to the enforcement powers of agencies around ticket touting. The rules on what ticket providers should provide have already been published, but the order gives enforcement agencies the power to act across borders. For example, if I bought a ticket to see a band, wherever I had bought that ticket online, there would be an expectation that it would be a fair ticket at a fair price, with the relevant information and the unique identifier. If that were not the case, Trading Standards in another part of the country—wherever that ticket was being sold—could act. The Minister is talking about the review, so will he clarify why he does not think this change will have an impact on the industry?”
“If he is not offering equivalent protection, passengers will continue to get what companies want them to have, rather than what they are entitled to do.”
“I thank the Minister for saying that, but it is a bit of a surprise to those of us who were on the Consumer Rights Public Bill Committee and heard specific assurances from the previous Government that they would offer equivalent protection. I shall give an example of the difference we might see. Over the summer, my rail journey was delayed and the rail company gave me a rail voucher. Under the Consumer Rights Act, I could ask for my money back, rather than be given a ticket to use with the same rail company. Is the Minister saying that he is comfortable for the train and aeroplane companies to dictate to passengers what appropriate compensation is? In other areas, there is equal protection for all consumers—I could ask for my money back, if that was what I wanted.”
“I want to push the Minister. Promises were made to the House during the passage of that legislation, which is why the second statutory instrument is so important. We were assured that passengers would get equivalent protection and that that would include the ability for the Competition and Markets Authority to conduct investigations. If he is excluding particular groups, then the provisions of this SI will also be excluded. That is a serious change to the assurances that we were given during the passage of the legislation. Can the Minister confirm that that is the case?”
“I am just curious; the Minister raises pertinent points about consulting with industries and ensuring that compensation and consumer rights fit well together, but can he explain why that did not happen during the passage of the Consumer Rights Act? From what he is saying, that was not the case. When we looked at the issue in Committee and asked about passenger rights, we were assured that those issues had been considered; he is now saying that that is not the case. Can he account for that variance in the stories being told to the House?”
“They lend in a way that is designed to encourage a persistent relationship. The problem is that they lend in a way that does not ensure that people have access to fair credit, but ensures that they continue to pay something back weekly. They make sure they always get money out of people. In what other industry is there such a high default rate, yet such high profits to be made? That should surely tell us that it is not a competitive industry, and that there are problems that need to be addressed. We have all seen at first hand people in our communities who are exploited by that predatory model of lending.”
“Friend the Member for Makerfield and I are as concerned about the rent-to-own sector and debt management companies as we are about payday lenders. That is why we have been campaigning for a number of years for reform of the sector. Hon. Members will recognise concern in my part of town about what we call the “BrightHouse knock”—when we are knocking doors during campaigns, we have to be careful not to knock like the bailiffs, because people think we are BrightHouse coming to repossess their goods. I may have expressed some surprise when my hon. Friend cited BrightHouse’s statement that it does not repossess goods—it seems, then, that that is happening only in my part of town. Rent-to-own companies are legal loan sharks. They operate in exactly the same way as the payday lending industry and a number of other consumer credit industries.”
“I want to talk a little about some of the work that was done on this issue for the Consumer Rights Act 2015, and I also want to say something about the broader context in which the firms operate. Finally, as I always like to be helpful, I would like to suggest some proposals for making progress on this issue to the Minister, and test whether he is willing to support them. I congratulate the hon. Member for Blackpool North and Cleveleys on securing this debate. He said he is concerned that shadow Front Benchers may not be aware of these companies and may make the same mistake that others have made in thinking that the rent-to-own sector is about housing. Let me reassure him that the Opposition call a spade a spade. Legal loan sharking takes many forms. My hon.”
“It is a pleasure, as always, to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone, and it is a genuine pleasure to take part in this debate. The Treasury Minister might be surprised to see a shadow Minister from the Business, Innovation and Skills team but, as he knows, I have form in this area. I am secretly delighted that he is now in the Treasury, especially on the issue of debt. I hope he will be the cuckoo in the nest of the Treasury when it comes to getting right the issue of how we help people in debt. First, I acknowledge the work that the all-party group, the hon. Member for Blackpool North and Cleveleys (Paul Maynard), and my hon. Friend the Member for Makerfield (Yvonne Fovargue) have been doing in this area.”
“I am sure that the Minister will know from his constituency that people cannot go without a washing machine or cooker. We may disagree about iPads but we can certainly agree that there is a case for basic white goods to be provided. It would be helpful to hear from the Minister about the commitment that the Government made last year to reviewing personal debt. We have not seen any further information, so will he update us on that review and the work that is being done? There is also the issue of how credit histories are affected by this form of predatory lending, because, even if customers get out of payments required for an individual credit agreement, if that affects their future ability to borrow and to go to alternative or mainstream providers, there is a problem.”
“We would like the Government to use the levy—in fact, to double the levy on the companies—to pay for that. The Minister may want to take up that idea; I do not know. However, we all know that having to pay to get out of debt extends the debt. It makes it harder for people to get into a debt-management agreement. With the companies we are talking about, it would be good to stop the clock once people start the process of getting a debt-management agreement, so that no more interest would be accrued, and there would be no more pressure, visits or BrightHouse knocks on the door. I encourage the Minister to go further and talk to his colleagues in the Department for Work and Pensions about a reinstitution of the social fund—funding for alternative ways in which people could get white goods in particular.”
“] The Minister says from a sedentary position that they already do this, but clearly they do not, given the levels of debt that people are getting into. We need to recognise that it is possible for affordability checks to deal with the potential cost of the goods—the doubling of prices—rather than the minimum that someone could pay. They should deal with the maximum that someone could pay. My hon. Friend the Member for Makerfield made a powerful point about breathing space. The companies do not give people breathing space when they get into financial difficulty. We want the Government to make a commitment to end fees for debt management. The fact that people have to pay to get out of debt compounds the issue, and I would like a time scale for that change. We recognise that the debt advice industry needs to grow.”
“Companies could be banned from requiring consumers to take out additional products alongside the initial credit agreement—separating out the insurance and warranty to make it clear that, aside from its not being compulsory to buy them, it would be illegal to try to sell such additional products at the same time. The companies could be required to undertake affordability checks based on the possible total cost of the agreement rather than the initial up-front price of the good, so that companies would have to reflect, when doing the affordability check, on what debt people could possibly get into by borrowing in that way, and whether they could pay the money back. We clearly need to change the way affordability checks are done. [ Interruption.”
“Will the Minister make a commitment to work with the Financial Conduct Authority and to get it to expand its remit, to look at the industries in question and how they can change? In particular, could there be a requirement on lenders to provide pre-contractual information on both the cash price of goods and the total cost of the credit agreement: the difference between the price at the start and what it could be by the end of the agreement? If consumers could have that up-front they would know exactly what the cost would be, including any additional fees and charges.”
“In the context where personal debt is rising—and that will cause a massive economic problem for us and put our recovery at risk—there is a compelling case to be much more proactive about predatory lending in the consumer credit market. With that idea in mind perhaps I may give the Minister some suggestions for things to do, and things to raise with the Financial Conduct Authority. He will know that I have a slight sense that the Financial Conduct Authority is playing catch-up. If the banks were tyrannosaurus rex, legal loan sharks are the velociraptors of the consumer credit market. They are fast, nimble and ever-evolving, and that is evident when we compare the rent-to-own sector with the way lending is done by the lumbering beasts of banks. That is why voluntary action is not enough to deal with the companies.”
“Member for Blackpool North and Cleveleys talked about mortgage debt, and many people with mortgages go to the companies because they have no alternative. If interest rates go up just 2% families will have to find £1,000 extra a year in interest alone, to keep a roof over their head. If they are also trying to pay off an expensive cooker or freezer, we can see what is coming down the road for them. Some of us who fought to retain the social fund will know about the lack of alternatives. Many credit unions do wonderful work trying to come up with alternatives, but the lack of options is compelling people towards the companies in question.”
“The Minister and I disagree about the Budget and whether it will make things worse or better, but we know people are finding that there is too much month at the end of their money. Therefore the companies we are talking about—and their credit agreements and their predatory lending behaviour—are here to stay, unless we show the political will to tackle them and unless we recognise how they make people’s already difficult situation worse. I may disagree with the hon. Member for Blackpool North and Cleveleys about the Government’s decision to abolish the term “child poverty”, but we can all agree that making it difficult for people to make ends meet by leaving them stuck with companies that exploit them and squeeze out every last penny will do no one any favours. The hon.”
“How are we making sure that consumers can exercise the rights they now have under the Act? That would also extend to marketing methods—the Minister will know about marketing lists—and how companies tell people their rights and make sure they know that they do not have to take out insurance or an extended warranty. Often such warranties are not worth the paper they are written on and offer consumers no additional protection or benefits. Is that being made plain to people? Why does all that matter? Why must we get to grips with those companies? It is because we know the issue is fundamentally about debt. Consumer and personal debt in this country are rising into what might be called uncharted territory. Since March, unsecured personal debt has gone up £48 billion. Personal debt is rising three times as fast as wages.”