Breathing Space Scheme

Debate between John Glen and Vicky Ford

Wednesday 19th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[John Glen]

I am extremely grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his comments. He played a significant role in the passage of the legislation that led to today’s announcement. He urges me once again on the timeframe, and I can assure him that my Treasury officials are working as rapidly as possible, but we must also ensure that it actually works. One of the questions he asked me previously, about what is included in the scheme and the range of public sector debts, has been a significant driver in those conversations. I acknowledge and take on board his comments.

[Vicky Ford (Chelmsford) (Con)]

I absolutely welcome the breathing space scheme, which will help people facing debts that they cannot repay. I join other Members in thanking citizens advice bureaux and organisations such as the Trussell Trust that help to signpost people to better debt advice. It has told me that young people, in particular, can get enormously concerned about their mobile phones being cut off, because if they lose their phones they lose their communications and any hope of finding work, for example. Will the Minister confirm that this will cover a wide range of debts and mean that people need not worry about losing their homes or their communications while their debts are sorted out?

[John Glen]

I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend for those observations and for mentioning the Trussell Trust, which is headquartered in my constituency and has done a lot of work in this area. The principles underpinning the scheme are based on the Insolvency Service’s system and include all debts covered by the system. There are a small number of exceptions—for example, deductions for child maintenance payments—but we have designed this so that it is meaningful. It is not about a holiday from ongoing payments; it is about dealing with arrears and debt. The expectation is that when people join the scheme they will continue to pay for everyday expenses as they occur.

Financial Services

Debate between John Glen and Vicky Ford

Thursday 26th April 2018 Westminster Hall

[John Glen]

The hon. Gentleman has made a valiant attempt to try to draw out from me something over which, as he is probably very aware, I have little control. I do share with him an appreciation of the centrality of financial services in the City of London and we have a shared understanding that, if the EU does not come to a place of understanding about City of London financial services, it would leave Europe a lot less competitive.

To address that, the Chancellor set out what our future regulatory framework should look like, underpinned by three things: a binding dialogue for regulatory requirements, supervisory co-operation arrangements that are reciprocal and reliable, and an independent arbitration mechanism to provide durable dispute resolution. That is clear. It is complex, but necessarily so, given what we are dealing with.

Reaching such an agreement with the EU need not be a challenging objective because the status quo is an unbeatable precedent to work from. Our markets are already deeply interconnected; our rule books are identical; and our mutual commitment to world-leading standards is unbeatable. The EU itself has challenged the notion that financial services cannot be addressed in trade negotiations, as evidenced in its approach to creating a deep bilateral framework with the US in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership negotiations. In those negotiations, the EU pitched a relationship based on mutual recognition of regulations and a unique dialogue on aligning future rule-making. TTIP is a precedent for the approach that we wish to take with the EU. It is in neither the UK’s nor the EU’s interest to exclude financial services from the future relationship.

The UK is clear that there are limitations to how much either of us can achieve unilaterally. The reality is that the European Council and European Parliament have now formally recognised the need to address the terms of market access in financial services between the UK and the EU, so we need to come to the table and discuss it further.

Myriad financial services on which businesses rely to reduce their costs are derived from or pass through, or are linked to, the UK market. Businesses also reap the benefits of the savings and capital flows to consumers across the continent. Those flows untap greater financial prospects for a broad range of people and allow them to access new products and services, such as innovative investment opportunities, tailored and appropriate debt products, and technology-driven solutions such as open banking.

My hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire talked about shared services in the context of the challenges relating to bank closures. The only inhibitor to that is the banks themselves—there is no restriction on finding a shared venue. I know from my conversations with banks in my constituency that phenomenal changes are going on in the age profile of bank users. Just before the Easter recess, I took the opportunity to visit different banking environments and a mobile banking facility in Derbyshire. I was very impressed with what I saw. It happened to be a Lloyds mobile bank, and it came to the village twice a week at the same time. It had disabled facilities. Of course, we all want to retain that certainty about the bank network, but that is not possible because it is a commercial decision. I am in active dialogue with a range of banks, as we all are as constituency MPs, and I know that these are difficult decisions. I commend my hon. Friend’s suggestion, and I raise it actively when I meet representatives of banks.

[Vicky Ford]

On bank branch closures, I too commend the suggestion about bringing together many banks to operate out of the same premises, although that could be difficult to achieve. People have raised with me the issue of depositing cash. The people who run the church or school fête tend to have large quantities of small denominations of cash. Is there more we can do to ensure that the Post Office offers that service?

[John Glen]

UK Finance and the Post Office have come to a new understanding about how the Post Office’s services are made available if the last bank leaves a town or community. In 99% of cases, the services that an individual non-business customer would wish to use are accessible in post offices. There are some limits—this needs to be checked, but I am pretty sure it is £2,000 in cash—but alternative arrangements can be made if necessary. Although I accept that in some cases there is a cultural barrier to the widespread use of post offices, there is no functional reason why they cannot provide the vast majority—99%—of the services that most consumers and 95% of small businesses want. I urge my hon. Friend to look into those options and make that clear to her constituents.