At Slough Borough Council’s Cabinet meeting on January 19, commissioners approved a new scheme to help tackle loan sharks in the town.
A specialist Slough team will be helping the council’s trading standards officers to target loan sharks in the Slough borough and help the most vulnerable people in the community.
The government-funded Stop Loan Sharks team will investigate and prosecute illegal money lending and related criminal offences, alongside Slough’s trading standards.
It started as a pilot project in the West Midlands in 2004 and has since expanded across England, covering the North-West, Yorkshire and Humber, South and South-East.
Keith Eaglestone, trading standards manager for Slough Borough Council, said: “I’m so pleased the new scheme was approved at the Cabinet meeting.
“Illegal loan lenders are incredibly hard to track down and target our most vulnerable sectors of the community.
“The team has been hugely successful in stamping out loan sharks, helping more than 7,000 victims, writing off around £8million of illegal debt and securing more than 35 years in prison sentences.
“Successful prosecutions have included loan sharks being convicted of kidnap, assault, threats to kill, intimidation and dealing counterfeit goods, as well as illegal money lending.”
A loan shark is an unlicensed money lender – licensed money lenders are regulated by the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) and must follow the OFT’s code of practice. Loan sharks operate outside the law and anyone who borrows from them is likely to: pay an extortionate interest rate (the highest found so far has been 117,000 per cent); be harassed if behind with payments; and be pressured into borrowing more to repay one debt with another.
Leader of the Slough council, Cllr Rob Anderson, added: “This new initiative is extremely welcome and one we were more than happy to approve.
“Loan sharks bring nothing but misery and, at times, violence to those who have felt they had no alternative but to borrow money from them.
“The remit of the Stop Loan Sharks team, along with Slough Borough Council, is to investigate illegal money lending activity, establish if a problem exists and, if so, bring the perpetrators to justice. The team is made up of highly experienced investigators with a broad range of backgrounds and investigative skills.
“This is an excellent example of how sharing resources on specific issues can bring benefits otherwise unavailable in providing support to vulnerable people.”
For more information, please contact Stop Loan Sharks hotline number, 0300 555 2222.
Slough Borough Council
