Justin Tomlinson MP and Robin Walker MP: How to protect vulnerable people who turn to payday lenders

Justin Tomlinson is the MP for the Swindon North and Robin Walker is the MP for Worcester

We have all watched TV when the adverts come on.  Quick cash quid in your pocket now, just text, call, go online, money in minutes. 5853 per cent APR representative pops up in the small print at the end. Most baulk at the high APR, yet in the 2011/12 an estimated £8 million payday loans were taken out in the UK.  Recent debate has painted these borrowers as financially excluded vulnerable people, lured into borrowing money that they cannot afford to pay back.

It is important to put payday lending in perspective.  A recent Consumer Finance Association survey of payday loan customers found that they fall into three main ‘groups’.  Young, technology-savvy people who borrow to cover short term emergency costs; middle aged parents who borrow to cover family costs; and those aged 45-50 who borrow to support their grown up children.  In each group, over 75 per cent of borrowers are employed.

What the report does not show however, are the vulnerable borrowers within each group and those that do not fit the ‘model’.  Yes, they may be the minority, but they are a vulnerable minority. and it is crucial that we ensure that they are protected.  They do not go to payday lenders through choice, but because they are the lender of last resort. 

Robin Walker MP: As an MP in a marginal seat, I say that Tory MPs should buckle down - and back Cameron

Robin Walker is the Member of Parliament for Worcester.

By supporting a Conservative Bill that lays the groundwork for an in-out referendum, David Cameron has fully satisfied the demands of the so- called 81 and all those who have spoken out in our party for a referendum. We should all now knuckle down, get behind him and focus on the enemy before us.

In 2011, I was one of those who felt very strongly that when backbench members pressed a backbench business motion on an EU referendum it should have been a free vote. I expressed my views in no uncertain terms, and for better or for worse I became one of the 81. Yesterday in Parliament, I spoke about many issues in the Queens Speech and in favour of a referendum bill, not because I believe we would win a Parliamentary vote on it in current circumstances, but because it would highlight how desperately out of touch and divided the Labour Party is on the issue.

Today the issue in our party is settled. Rightly, we are putting forward legislation in this Parliament for a referendum in the next one. Debating it will show how much more in tune with our voters we are on this issue than either our coalition colleagues in the Liberal Democrats or the Labour Party.