22 March 2006
The Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown is being urged to deal with the nation's personal debt, ahead of his Budget announcement today.
Lembit Opik, leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats, said the Chancellor should face up to the "skyrocketing debt time bomb" he believed to be threatening the UK's economy.
"The British public now owe over a trillion pounds in personal debt," he warned.
"The interest on that debt alone is over £1 million every ten minutes of ever hour of every day all year round! No economy is safe when it's so dependent on unearned expenditure. It's an economic accident waiting to happen."
An awareness of debt problems should be taught through the National Curriculum, he agued, adding that Mr Brown also had to deal with making the inflation rate include house price inflation.
"Small measures like protecting consumers from hidden debt charges on credit and store cards and establishing a code for mortgage payment protection insurance will help a little.
"But, at heart, we'll only get consumer debt sorted out if we get the inflation rate sorted. Since much of this debt is secured on houses, it's a link the chancellor simply must not ignore."
Compare secured loans and find the best secured loan for you with the uSwitch.com loans comparison service
© 2008 Adfero Ltd
Content for the uSwitch.com market news service is provided by a third party, Adfero Ltd. Whilst uSwitch.com makes reasonable efforts to check the reliability of this content, uSwitch.com does not guarantee the accuracy thereof or endorse the views or opinions given by Adfero Ltd, unless expressly stated otherwise.