February 4
Stella Creasy yesterday tabled a House of Commons debate on Consumer Credit and Debt Management, calling for greater regulation in the high cost credit market. Greater access to affordable credit was discussed as part of the solution to controlling the predatory nature of high cost doorstep or payday lenders. MP Sheila Gilmore discussed the impact of the end of the DWP Growth Fund stating:
“I would have been pressing them [the government] to extend the growth fund because it has built up many credit unions and other community-based financial institutions to provide an alternative for people…Without that lending capacity however, many such organisations will have to reduce their lending activities substantially. The alternatives that people often say should be in place before we legislate will therefore not be in place if we do not go on expanding through the growth fund.”
Many MPs also used the platform to promote the DWP Growth Fund and its CDFI recipients, and asked if the government would be extending the fund beyond March 2011. No concrete answers were given on this issue. The cdfa has recently posted an article on the Growth Fund evaluation undertaken by the recent Treasury evaluation.
Ms Gilmore went onto discuss the benefits of the governments Community Investment Tax Relief (CITR)
“There is one further small provision that the Minister might want to consider: reforming and extending community investment tax relief. Many community development financial institutions-community-based lending institutions that lend to individuals and businesses-would like that, and I hope that the Government are prepared to consider this further measure that is part of the wider jigsaw puzzle.”
The motion on tighter controls on the cost of credit was rejected by 271 votes to 156
A full transcript of the debate can be found here