The high streets are filling up with payday loan companies, proving that lending small sums at eye-watering interest to the down-at-heel is one of the few profitable businesses left in 21st century Britain. When you’re being invited to ‘consolidate your debt into one easily-managed, monthly, punishment beating’, you know that something’s gone badly wrong.
But ‘Honest’ John Banks, president of the Association of Pawnbrokers, Loan Sharks, Usurers, Shysters, Spivs and Ne’er-do-wells, denies that members of his association are extortionists who take advantage of the most vulnerable people in society.
“When people think of loan sharks they think of a big guy coming round to your door with a baseball ball. But we’ve moved on. This is 2012, people! Borrowing money, these days, is a fun lifestyle choice for people who, like Max Moseley, find themselves strapped for cash. Anyway, we find that a sock full of marbles works just as well”...
