Our Society Depends on Trust

Written by Dr. Vincent Cable MP and published in Richmond Informer on Mon 21st Jul 2003

Our society depends on trust. Without it we would be permanently involved in legal disputes or smothered in government regulations.

Yet, in commerce, trust is often abused. This week a Twickenham-based telecoms company asked me to help them to fight telephone call card rackets. Their competitors often cheat consumers by giving card buyers less time than they pay for: the digital equivalent of shopkeepers with dodgy weighing scales.

I also met the leading lights in the building industry who acknowledged that shoddy workmanship and outright cheating by 'cowboy' contractors have ruined the industry's reputation. Many local homeowners and leaseholders have their own horror stories, and no redress.

The large scale misselling of complex financial products - private pensions, endowments, shared appreciation mortgages and split investment trusts - have undermined trust in banks and insurance companies and those who sell financial products.

I still hear too many local examples of aggressive doorstep and telephone selling, prize draw scams and other dodges to trap the unwary.

Sometimes trust can be restored through self-regulation. Corgi is now accepted as a quality standard for gas fitting. AA and RAC tests have taken the hazard out of second hand car sales. In some industries ISO quality standards are accepted the world over. We still - broadly - trust doctors and solicitors to maintain their own standards.

But if the public lose confidence we then need more law and regulation to ensure that consumers are not cheated; airlines, trains, new cars and toys are safe; butchers do not sell contaminated meat and new clothes do not catch fire or disintegrate.

If standards of integrity decline we need, and have to pay for, a growing army of regulators, ombudsmen and trading standards officers. This is the price for loss of trust.