Mr. Speaker, payday lenders and other financial institutions have risen up in a community like Winnipeg North to fill the gap. This is an area that is not regulated. Consumers are left in a very vulnerable position, without regulations, without accountability, and many in fact are being ripped off.
I am not here to suggest that all payday lenders are bad, are vultures, or are trying to take advantage of ordinary folks, but I am saying that there are some. It is an area that has to be regulated, given the numbers in the field today, and given the fact that so many people rely on them.
I do not need to go into the horror stories, members know them. We know about individuals paying something like 1,000% or more interest for a short term loan, getting into a cycle of indebtedness and not being able to get out of it, and losing their homes and not being able to provide for themselves and their families.
So, it is an issue that has to be dealt with. The only way that we can deal with it is to set aside the Criminal Code, so that provinces like Manitoba, which has a very sophisticated regulatory scheme, are able to exercise their powers and provide some governance in an area that has been largely neglected. That is what this bill simply sets out to do. It sets aside the Criminal Code for those provinces that have demonstrated they have a regulatory scheme ready to kick in and deal with the problems at hand.
It is not something that takes away powers from the provinces. It does not give new powers to the federal government. It does not touch this whole issue of federal-provincial relations. It is not an issue for Quebec because it has put in place its own regulatory provisions around lowering the criminal rate of interest from 50% to 35%. That means it is dealing with this issue in its own way.
We are saying that the rest of the country needs to have a mechanism for doing so. It is impossible under the current provisions. So, we look forward to supporting this bill on an urgent basis and getting it up and running, so that Canadians have some protection in this important area of payday lending and other financial institutions.