UK government becomes a friend of the people?
The UK government has today announced wide sweeping reforms of the UK finance arena to end what it describes as "unfair bank charges" and "excessive interest rates on credit cards". Thankfully the government has given the Office of Fair Trading and other regulators increased powers to ban excessive charges on credit cards as well as unfair bank charges.
The government has also introduced a seven day cooling off period for those taking out store cards as well as more disclosure for those looking for a new credit card. At the moment it seems as though the coalition government has picked up the baton originally held by Gordon Brown and his Labour team but as ever the proof will be in the pudding with regards to added protection for UK consumers.
There is no doubt that the UK government has started well in what are very difficult and very demanding times. There are high hopes that David Cameron will follow through on many of his pledges with regards to additional consumer protection in many areas of the economy. However, in a reminder that spin will always be around, the last few days have been spent tainting the name of the previous government with a number of accusations regarding budgets and spending in the final throes of the previous Labour government.
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