Blame lenders for bad debt, says minister

Lenders have only themselves to blame for rising levels of bad debts and the government does not intend to regulate companies offering insolvency agreements, a government minister has said.

Trade and Industry Minister, Jim Fitzpatrick, said the increase in the number of personal insolvencies needs to be monitored, but he dismissed requests by the big banks to introduce rules for companies that offer individual voluntary arrangements or IVAs.

Mr Fitzpatrick told the Financial Times: "If we've got a rise in indebtedness, if we've got a rise in people having difficulty servicing that debt ... then maybe the banks are lending too much money, or maybe they're not being as careful as they used to be in scrutinising the applications."

He added: "If they'd not lent it [the money] in the first place then they wouldn't be in the difficulty of trying to recover it."

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