Thank you Micheal for starting the thread.

The Taking Control of Goods Regulations were introduced in April 2014 and by now, the government had pledged to undertake a Three Year Review. Instead of focusing on the much needed and long overdue changes that are necessary to improve the ways in which debts are enforced by bailiffs, the tax payer funded 'advice sector' (Citizens Advice and Stepchange etc) are using this consultation to YET AGAIN, pursue their own policy agenda which is to force the Government to appoint an Independent Regulator. Worse still, they are looking to achieve this.........by misleading the public and government with false and misleading data.

The following page from the Citizens Advice website is a good example:

https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/about-us/our-campaigns/all-our-current-campaigns/bailiff-reform/

 

The following page from the Citizens Advice website is a good example:

 

https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/about-us/our-campaigns/all-our-current-campaigns/bailiff-reform/

Scroll to the bottom of the above link and you will be taken to a CAB Blog entitled: Bailiffs are Breaking the Rules and They are Getting Away with It. Since last November, there is just ONE 'example' of a bailiff 'breaking the rules'.

https://wearecitizensadvice.org.uk/bailiffs-are-breaking-the-rules-and-theyre-getting-away-with-it-eb1d920548e0

That page has received 62 'thanks' (which CAB refer to as 'claps'). None are from the public. They are from these 4 people:

https://wearecitizensadvice.org.uk/bailiffs-are-breaking-the-rules-and-theyre-getting-away-with-it-eb1d920548e0

So, what EVIDENCE are Citizens Advice relying upon to substantiate their bizarre claim in this page that in the past TWO YEARS, they have found that 2.2 million people report being contacted by bailiffs and more that a third of them (850,000) people....have experiences bailiffs breaking the rules.

https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/about-us/policy/policy-research-topics/debt-and-money-policy-research/a-law-unto-themselves-how-bailiffs-are-breaking-the-rules/

Furthermore, Citizens Advice claim that their survey supposedly found that:

6% had seen bailiffs use force to break into homes

21% had experienced an intimidating phone call

24% of people polled had an affordable payment offer rejected

17% experienced a threat to break in, (excluding magistrate court fine enforcement)

3% experienced bailiffs entering the home when only children were present

12% of cases report bailiffs visiting the home outside ‘reasonable hours’ of 6am and 9pm

19% report being charged VAT on top of bailiff fees

24% report being told that a payment arrangement could only be set up if an enforcement agent makes a personal visit.

So, the important question is: How did the CAB arrive at these alarming figures?

The answer......they simply carried out a short survey and relied upon responses from 277 individuals. More later on......