On 30 October I attended an event in Parliament to support Loan Smart, a new charity focused on helping people identify and understand illegal lending. The charity seeks to prevent consumers from failing into the hands of illegal ‘loan sharks’ through raising awareness, providing an online tool to check that a lender is authorised and signposting useful sources of advice. It is estimated that there are 310,000 consumers borrowing from illegal lenders. These people are often in desperate financial circumstances and lending from ‘loan sharks’ is likely only to worsen their situation.