Martin Vickers MP calls for action on 'plague' of nuisance phone calls
MP Martin Vickers has called for action to prevent “a plague” of nuisance phone calls.
Speaking in a Westminster Hall debate, the Cleethorpes MP said: “The present system is failing and totally unsatisfactory.
“It does not work in any meaningful sense. If we are to stop the plague of unwanted and unsolicited calls from which we all suffer, something must be done – and quickly.”
Mr Vickers said companies should be limited to calling a particular answering machine once every 24 hours.
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He continued: “I understand that that has been knocked about and debated previously, but if it could be enforced, that would be a major step forward.”
Mr Vickers also assured industry regulator Ofcom that such calls were “continuing to cause concern, and I hope that it will act more robustly in future”.
“The aim must be for a system in which our constituents do not need to complain because they can register with the Telephone Preference Service (TPS) – that is it, job done, no more calls,” he said.
“If the calls did keep coming, there would be a clear breach of the rules and action should follow.
“I am of an age at which I can remember knocks on the door from door-to-door salesmen selling anything from brushes to the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
“Nuisance calls are a modern menace equivalent to those door-to-door salesmen. Our constituents need a single point of contact with adequate resources and full powers to regulate that nuisance industry. When will that happen?”
In response, Media Minister Edward Vaizey said: “I know it is a problem from my own postbag…we must do more to combat the menace of silent and unsolicited marketing calls.”
Comments
by ambidou
Saturday, March 09 2013, 1:51PM
“Simply provide an 'accidentally' wrong number to the bank and building societies when opening an account/credit card, as it is compulsory to provide a number. Or provide the number of the grimsby royal mail sorting office.....which just continually rings... It is these banks and building societeies who sell on your numbers to marketing companies, I know that for a fact.”