Baroness Kramer (LD)

My Lords, I will be extremely brief because my Bench has just spoken very clearly on this issue. I share with the Conservative Front Bench concerns about accountability with a further removal of powers directly into the hands of the regulator, and had they pressed their Amendment 1, we would have supported it. Very briefly, I will address the other amendments. I am still in a state of genuine concern that the Government will not accept an amendment that would confirm that the changes they are proposing to the Consumer Credit Act, which will be absorbed now into the role of the FCA, will not involve a diminution of consumer credit protection; this is the non-diminution of rights that the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, described. Of course, the FCA could keep those rights in place, but there is nothing that compels it to do so. I find it extraordinary that we cannot be given this reassurance. However, I am more exercised than anything else about the position of mortgage prisoners. The people who have been impacted, and many are now elderly, have dealt with a shocking situation over the past years. We could now give them relief for the remaining years in which they will be tangled with paying extraordinary levels of interest on mortgages that were taken out in good faith, for which they properly qualified and which were, at the time, market-standard mortgages. It has happened because, in essence, an arm of government has made mistakes when it has sold on those loans to vulture funds. It is shocking that we have not corrected this. The amendment before us today is new thinking. It is incredibly effective at making sure that, going forward, this incredible injustice is ended, and I hope very much that, even in these last few minutes, the Government will think again and provide support.