Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Field of Birkenhead Excerpts

Thursday 18th October 2018 Commons Chamber

The right hon. Member for Meriden, representing the Church Commissioners, was asked—

[Frank Field (Birkenhead) (Ind)]

1. What progress the Church of England has made on bringing together organisations and people of good will to buy the Wonga loan book.

[The Second Church Estates Commissioner (Dame Caroline Spelman)]

I pay tribute to the right hon. Gentleman for his extensive work on this issue. The Archbishop of Canterbury has been in discussions with the charity and finance sectors about how to minimise the potential harm to Wonga’s former customers who are unable to pay back their loans. We are hopeful that debt collection best practice will be applied in recovering any outstanding debts.

[Frank Field]

I thank the right hon. Lady for that reply. With reference to the written answer she gave me about how the commissioners are using their huge portfolio of funds to push firms in the right direction, does she accept that the list of firms whose annual general meetings the commissioners turned up at to push social justice was short and rather disappointing? Will she meet me urgently to see how that programme can be extended?