§ Mr. BellinghamTo ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what steps her Department is taking to protect consumers from excessive levels of interest charged on(a) small loans, (b) credit cards and (c) store cards. [132861]
§ Mr. SutcliffeThere are currently in excess of 200,000 businesses licensed under the Consumer Credit Act 1974 and monitoring the activities of all these businesses would create a significant burden on legitimate business.
The Consumer Credit Act 1974 contains provisions that allow a consumer to challenge an extortionate credit bargain. However, only about 30 extortionate credit cases are known to have reached the courts since the Act came into force and, of those, in only 10 did the court find the agreement to be extortionate.
I believe that these provisions have not operated effectively in enabling consumers to challenge unfair credit agreements and I intend to publish a White Paper this autumn, which will contain details of how I intend to make it easier for consumers to challenge unfair credit transactions.