Financial Guidance and Claims Act 2018 (Naming and Consequential Amendments) Regulations 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-05-01
Topic: Domestic Commerce
William David McKenzie (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, with this take note Motion my noble friend Lord Stevenson has made an important intervention and it is a timely reminder that we should be making progress on matters covered by the Act. Indeed, he has covered a lot of ground, so I can be brief—or briefish We are reminded that the decision to name the body the Money and Pensions Service through regulation was to minimise the risk that individuals and organisations might impersonate it prior to its launch. In the event, it seems that it would not have taken a team from Bletchley Park to get close to its actual name. Could the Minister say whether there have, in practice, been successful attempts to impersonate the body before today? To what extent is the juxtaposition of pensions and money guidance in the title considered sufficient to repel impersonators? This is not just about a name. Getting the business infrastructure of the body in place should involve the making of transfer schemes under Schedules 1 and 2. Are these now complete? So far as its members are concerned, could the Minister confirm that the appropriate proportion of execs and non-execs has been secured for its governance? We do not have the benefit of an impact assessment, but we have an explanation of why not. Could we be told the key monetary amounts attached to these transfers We have been reminded of the Act’s key provisions, which were the establishment of a single financial guidance body with the objective, inter alia, of improving the ability of members of the public to make informed financial decisions. The strategic function of the body is the development and co-ordination of, "a national strategy to improve … financial capability", and to improve, "the provision of financial education to children and young people" A number of noble Lords focused on this aspect of the Act and its ambition. We debated this latter point at some length and the extent to which there was scope to use the national curriculum, which had less than full mandatory configuration. I think that we on the Financial Exclusion Committee were surprised by just what a small percentage of the total education infrastructure was subject to the mandatory national curriculum. I cannot remember the precise statistic, but it was less than half. Therefore, that mechanism could not be used effectively to undertake the education one would ideally want. Can the Minister say whether there has been any early planning to enhance the education of young people? It featured strongly in our debates There has already been delivery on some aspects of the Act, such as the banning of pensions cold calling, but for other key aspects it seems we have hardly got to first base. It may be a bit early, but can the Minister say anything about how effective the cold calling ban is proving? It is a vital power to stop the scammers. What are the key challenges in making it more effective The debt respite scheme, referred to extensively by my noble friend, is increasingly relevant to consumers. As we heard, StepChange, in its 2018 statistics yearbook covering personal debt, set out the scale of problem debt. I will not repeat it, but there was the staggering statistic that it had one new client every 48 seconds. As for the age profile, as we have heard, there is a continuing increase in the proportion of younger clients. Over half its clients or their partners are actually in work. Not surprisingly, a rising proportion of clients rent their homes. To focus on housing and its impact on spirals of debt is absolutely right. I recall from my time as a local councillor, going back a bit, when right to buy came in and people had a bright new shiny door for a little while, then they mortgaged the property again to have some improvements and then again to have an overseas holiday. They ended up homeless and back with the local authority. It is a very important area Council tax arrears feature at the top of the list of the bills that create household debt. There, we can put the blame squarely at the feet of the Government for changing the benefit rules and grinding down on local authority support for these matters.