Hire-Purchase Hardships and Hopes

Abstract

Hire-purchase is no longer the preserve of the poor. Since the Second World War it has become respectable and has helped much to raise industrial production and the standard of living. The social importance of the law of hire-purchase has increased proportionately to the leap in the national hire-purchase and instalment debt from some £461,000,000 in 1955 to £950,000,000 in 1961. Public and judicial dissatisfaction with the law has become increasingly apparent. During and since 1961, the centenary of (probably) the first finance company in the world, a vintage crop of cases of major importance has illustrated some of the main defects of the present system and demonstrated the still unsatisfactory position of the hirer. Numerous recent articles in legal and other periodicals harshly criticise the law and urge reforms, some of which were proposed in two abortive Private Member's Bills. Mr. F. Montgomery's Hire-Purchase of Motor-Vehicles Bill failed to get beyond first reading in February 1961 and Mr. W. T. Williams’ Hire-Purchase Bill, designed to extend and supplement the Hire-Purchase Acts of 1938 and 1954, was talked out on second reading in December 1961, after the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade had recommended the House to await the report of the Molony Committee on Consumer Protection.