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10 November 2005
The Financial Services Authority (FSA) has dealt debt-laden consumers a blow by questioning the appropriateness of handing it responsibility for policing consumer credit.
The body has become responsible for the overseeing of mortgage sales and general insurance over the past year but, responding to calls that it should take on the consumer credit market, it told the Treasury Select Committee that its resources would probably be inadequate for such a task.
Around 14,000 new firms were put under the FSA's authority after the mortgage switch, but any move into the credit market would probably saddle it with what it considers to be an unmanageable extra number.
Sir Callum McCarthy, the FSA chairman, said in the Times: "Giving the FSA responsibility for consumer credit means that we would have to take on another 100,000 licensees."
The FSA states its primary objective as being "to promote efficient, orderly and fair markets and to help retail consumers achieve a fair deal" - but attempting to delve into a market whose consumers have racked up £1 trillion worth of debt looks likely to be a step too far on this front.
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