Nuisance Calls

Cathy Jamieson Excerpts

Thursday 16th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Cathy Jamieson (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to follow a number of excellent speeches. I was interested to hear the Minister give his definition of what “shortly” might mean. When I was a Minister in Scotland, I remember a civil servant telling me that “shortly” was “sooner than in due course”, but he was not prepared to commit to anything more than that.

I congratulate the Backbench Business Committee on enabling the debate to take place. I congratulate the hon. Member for Edinburgh West (Mike Crockart) on his excellent contribution, which provided all the technical detail and information on this important issue. Perhaps unusually for me, I will not be having a go at the Minister on this occasion. He has been helpful in bringing together the different organisations and the different parts of the regulatory system to try to deal with the issue.

I was prompted to speak largely because of correspondence from constituents—I have taken an interest in the issue since arriving in this place because many constituents have made complaints to me—but also because of the excellent campaign run by The Sunday Post, to which the hon. Gentleman referred. The wonders of modern technology are such that during the course of the debate I have been able to follow, via a Twitter feed, the views of The Sunday Post, and I am sure that many people will have taken a great interest in what hon. Members have said.

Many people have asked why we cannot just have a simple mechanism—pressing a button or sending a text back—to deal with nuisance calls. Surely the wonders of technology that give us such excellent Twitter feeds should enable me simply to press the appropriate button if I decide—and heaven forfend that I should; this would never be the case—to block The Sunday Post and to hear no more from it. I therefore find it difficult to believe that there is not a way for people who do not want to receive nuisance calls to deal with them more efficiently and effectively.

We have heard that many elderly people are often the victims of silent calls or nuisance calls, and they can be the people most distressed by them. The work undertaken by Age Concern Scotland, which was referred to, is important, as is the work of local authorities. We should expand on that work. However, it is not only elderly and vulnerable people who have to deal with nuisance calls, texts and faxes—for those who still operate fax machines. They are also a problem for business.

The hon. Gentleman referred to calls which say that the Government want the business to know something. Those types of calls give real concern to the individuals receiving them, because they may not be sure whether they are a scam or something actually relating to Government policy. For example, energy efficiency is often talked about. Businesses will receive a text, fax or other form of information that implies that it is somehow linked to the Government when that is not the case.

By way of illustration—this does not relate specifically to the debate, but I might come back to it at another time—a businessman in my constituency recently contacted me to say he had received something that looked like a Government publication giving him information on how to apply for grants, but when he signed up and paid almost £400, it turned out simply to be information he could have received from me, the business gateway or someone in the local authority’s economic development department, without parting with any cash. In such cases, as when elderly people and others sign up for things over the phone, when people discover it is a scam, they are often embarrassed to admit to it, and so do not come forward. I am sure there are many examples of businesses responding to these things and then discovering they were not what they purported to be.

We have heard about the extreme complexity of the regulatory framework, and I want to mention offshore calls. I have recently answered, or attempted to answer, the phone in my home and either discovered that the number or information relates to a company operating in the UK but calling from offshore, or made that assumption because no information has been provided. I understand the difficulty with the complexity of the regulations, but none the less I hope the Government can address that problem.

As constituents have also told me, it is easy enough for companies to receive these calls, but extremely difficult for them to call back and get hold of a person to complain to. Often they are advised to register online or to complain in writing, but it would be much simpler if the minute a call came in, they could press a button and send a message or immediately get through to someone and say, “Look, this has happened just now. What can you do about it?”

Constituents have also complained about premium rate phone numbers. I know the Government are looking at that in relation to public services, but people often complain to me that when they call one of these numbers, they have to hang on for ages and press a series of buttons, only to be referred to a website at the end. Such things do not give people any confidence that the industry, or indeed Government and politicians—we also suffer these complaints—are taking it seriously enough. I hope the Minister will respond to that.

Hon. Members have mentioned the number of calls to people who have taken out loans. The hon. Member for Edinburgh West gave some interesting examples. It will be interesting to hear how many more unsolicited approaches he gets from payday loan companies now that he has admitted to having used them on an experimental basis. For people already in difficulty, however, and who perhaps have health or mental health problems, to be pursued to that extent is unacceptable. I hope that the Minister will take account of the suggestions of the Select Committee and hon. Members today, including the shadow Minister, who, for good reasons, could not stay for the full debate.

If someone signs up and gives permission for such calls, that ought not to be ad infinitum, but to be reviewed after a while, in particular given the complexity of how people give permission. Sometimes they might not realise exactly what they are signing up for and that they will be subject to a range of marketing from several different companies, not just the one company they are dealing with. Also, there is the difference between opting in and opting out. I am sure that all of us, at some stage, have failed to untick the box or have ticked the box at the wrong time and subsequently received a huge amount of information we did not want.

We have heard helpful examples of progress being made—as with TalkTalk—but it is unacceptable that BT wants to introduce more charges, such as for the 1571 service and caller ID. For many elderly people using these services, the cost—even if only a couple of pounds on the phone bill—can be a considerable amount for them. Sometimes they fear the technology or do not trust it and they are worried, particularly if they have had experience of the TPS system, that the technology might not in itself solve the problem.

We have had a useful debate, and I hope that the Government will take account of what has been said. I know from the Minister’s comments at various meetings and events that I have attended that he takes this issue seriously. Recalling his definition of spring, which stretches to November, I hope that he will be able to take action shortly and do something this winter, providing some comfort to the thousands of people who have signed the petitions, seen their MPs and written to the newspapers asking for action. I know that the Minister wants to see something happen; we now need to hear what it is going to be. We hope that it will be sooner rather than later. I end with a final reference to The Sunday Post because if the Minister can achieve that, it will be “the very dab”—exactly how The Sunday Post would put it.