Baroness Kramer (LD)

My Lords, I have only a few comments on this group. As I listened to the comments on Amendment 17A, particularly those of my noble friend Lady Bowles and the noble Baroness, Lady Altmann, I understood what reminded them of mortgage prisoners. In that case, people who held mortgages with banks that failed, and who were rescued by the Treasury, were then sold on to private holders who were not themselves lenders of mortgages. In effect, they lost the ability to refinance, and so they remained imprisoned in very high-rate mortgages at a time when everyone else was able to remortgage. We can see echoes of that in some of the limitations that would be introduced by these amendments. I am therefore always concerned about those time limitations, particularly in situations where assets can be sold on, as they often and increasingly are today. Amendment 44, from the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, seeks to deal with the issue of consumer redress. If a consumer has been abused in some way and has a moral right to redress—a right in law—should that be lost simply because we have a regulator that fails to act promptly and within a reasonable time? I understand that it is tough for the industry, because it leaves it with uncertainty, but some of these products are life-changing for individual consumers and have life consequences. That is what made me think of mortgage prisoners; their lives were completely ruined by that process. Where there are such consequences for the individual, it is very concerning to take away the right to redress because there was a delay in the functioning of the regulator. I understand that it means that the industry has to live with uncertainty, but my advice to it is to behave well to your customers. That really is the very best way not to get into these issues.