Orders of the Day — HIRE PURCHASE (No. 2) BILL [Lords]

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 18 February 1964.

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Photo of Mr Cyril Bence Mr Cyril Bence , Dunbartonshire East 12:00, 18 February 1964

Whenever Scottish hon. Members on this side of the House have mentioned the case of Napier's, in Scotland, we have been told that the firm is acting within the law and is merely pursuing the normal commercial practice of the credit system. If the hon. Member says that this is not common commercial practice but is unjust commercial practice, why has not something been done about it? I still believe that the Bill provides further evidence that even with operators working within the present commercial system the consumer stands in an unjust and unfair relationship with the producer, distributor, and financier.

Another thing that it shows is that money is made much easier by financing a product than by manufacturing or distributing it. Between the wars many companies manufacturing consumer durables went to the wall, while the Dominion Trust was growing fat. It still is. One of the finest ways to make money is to get into the 5 per cent. business. It is easier to make money that way than by doing the hard, practical engineering work involved in manufacturing products. My heart will never bleed for the finance houses. I have always thought that they made far more money out of our economic system than did those who produced the goods. I have never heard of any of them going bankrupt, but several firms with which I have had dealings in the past 40 years have gone to the wall.

Many of the matters that I want to raise are not covered by the Bill. The first concerns several unfortunate cases of which I have heard. I give one as an example. A retired gentleman bought a radiogram and owed £80 on it. Unfortunately, he knocked over an oil heater and had a fire, as a result of which his set was destroyed. It was not insured. When a person buys a motor car he has to take out insurance if he intends to take that car on the road, and a person who buys a house on mortgage has to take out insurance against fire and flood. My hope is that it will be possible for a system of compulsory insurance against fire and flood to be introduced in the hire purchase of consumer durables. I do not know whether that would be practicable, but I hope something like it can be done.