Caroline Ansell
Main Page: Caroline Ansell (Conservative - Eastbourne)Department Debates - View all Caroline Ansell's debates with the HM Treasury
Breathing Space Scheme
Caroline Ansell Excerpts(7 years, 1 month ago)
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Caroline Ansell (Eastbourne) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Turner.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Rochester and Strood (Kelly Tolhurst) on securing this important debate, in which I am able to speak on behalf of the heartbreaking number of children in families who have fallen into problem debt in Eastbourne and Willingdon, which is estimated to be about 4,000. I am also thinking about the national picture, in which 2 million or more children are caught in the same situation.
There is no statutory scheme to support families in temporary difficulty who are seeking to repay their debts. The Children’s Society and StepChange have called for the breathing space so ably championed by my hon. Friend, and they have identified in it a practical and pragmatic way forward to help such families.
Debt reaches far into every aspect of life. More than half of the 500,000 people who sought help with debt last year were also seeking mental health support from their GP. StepChange estimated that the cost of problem debt to the state and to society, on top of the personal and human costs, is about £8 billion.
Speaking as a teacher, I would simply add that no matter how contemporary the curriculum, how handsome the funding or how stellar the school building, children who live under stress simply struggle to learn, recall and fulfil their potential. Debt reaches right into the heart of everything we want to see for our children in their education. With 2 million children involved, that is hugely concerning.
A breathing space would protect those vulnerable children living in families in problem debt by giving the families the time and space to come to an affordable and safe repayment plan. Between a third and half of those who contacted their creditors for help said that creditors had not given them any kind of temporary space. Without such protection, households trying to deal with their debts are often thrown into worse and cumulatively more damaging financial difficulties.
My hon. Friend’s words still ring true for me—“win, win, win”—because her Bill ultimately would be just that for all parties, because they all stand to benefit, including creditors. A breathing space scheme is not about writing off debt; it is simply about allowing people the time to pay back the money owed. The credit companies get their money back, families get out of the debt trap and children can have their childhood back. The Minister understands those concerns, and good work is already going on in the area, so I look forward to his comments and to learning more about some of that work, because the Government share the value of wanting to support those who find themselves in problem debt.