New Page 2

Personal debt in Sheffield is estimated to cost in excess of ONE HUNDRED MILLION POUNDS; that's money which is being taken away from our City in interest/admin charges. Money that goes into our poorest communities in the form of low wages and Government benefits, is for many households, having no "benefit" other than enabling them to for their debts - for many people they are never likely to be in a position to "pay off" their debts because they don't have an adequate income, don't have equity in their property and don't have family or friends who are able to help.

There is a lot of money to be made ot of debt, you only have to look at Yellow Pages or see adverts on Sky TV to know that "easy payment" terms and "bring all your debts to us" offers are good business for the predatory lenders; but, not good business for people who have ocme to rely on this way of living.

THURSDAY, 10^th JULY 2003

PAT CONATY

Senior Associate at the

New Economics Foundation (NEF)

will be at

Holy Family Church

Eastern Drive, Arbourthorne, Sheffield

7.30 – 9.00 pm

Pat will talk about his work to tackle Financial Exclusion

and on the NEF Pocket Book

“Profiting from Poverty - Why debt is big business in Britain.”

A copy of the Book can be downloaded from

www.neweconomics.org

PLEASE R.S.V.P - 0114 223 0225 or EMail

Pat was born in the USA, has lived in Britain since 1978. He was Senior manager at Birmingham Settlement, an inner city regeneration agency from 1985 – 1999 and founded many innovative services including the National Money Advice Training Unit, National Debtline, Business Debtline and the Aston Reinvestment Trust – the first mutually owned, community reinvestment fund in the UK. He currently works as a consultant with the New Economics Foundation and is an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Birmingham. He has published many reports in the field of money advice, fuel poverty, ecological enterprise, the social economy and community reinvestment. He is Trustee of the Scarman Trust and a Director of Birmingham Credit Union Development Agency.

Sheffield Council and Yorkshire Forward rejected a bid to fund a not-for-profit loan company. The company would have provided an alternative source of finance for people who are currently forced into the hands of loan sharks and other predatory lenders - often paying in excess of 300% APR - people who can least afford to pay excessive interest charges won't benefit from the economic regeneration of Sheffield.

BBC Watchdog reported on the activities of predatory lenders. John Battle MP said:
"Companies like BrightHouse may seem to be offering good cheap deals. In fact because they charge such exorbitant amounts of interest are locking the poor into debt. "In effect I would argue that they [predatory lenders] are really leeching off the life blood of the poor, forcing them into deep debt for the rest of their lives".

IMPACT has proposed a solution, a not-for-profit finance company that would give people who currently use predatory lenders access to loans - an opportunity to free themselves from the high costs associated with paying off debts. View an Executive Summary of our proposal.

In February 2003, The Star reported on the activities of loan sharks. Also, in January 2003, BBC Watchdog broadcast a programme about loan sharks.