Prime Minister grilled by Mark Hunter MP – ‘When will the Government take action on the blight of Nuisance Calls?’

MP for Cheadle constituency, Mark Hunter, has again taken his campaign against Nuisance Calls to the very top by putting the Prime Minister on the spot at Prime Minister's Questions Time on Wednesday this week.

After being called on by the Speaker of the House of Commons, Mark asked:

'Hundreds of thousands of people across the United Kingdom have their privacy invaded every day of the week by the menace of nuisance phone calls. Those unwanted and intrusive calls blight the lives of far too many of our citizens. Does the Prime Minister think that the Government have done enough to tackle the problem, and will he support stronger action against the perpetrators?'

In response, the Prime Minister said:

'I am happy to look at what my hon. Friend says. We do have the Telephone Preference Service that helps people to avoid a lot of those calls, but I have had pressure for more to be done, and I am happy to look at what he says.'

Mark began his 'No to Nuisance Calls' campaign in January 2013, asking for local residents to sign a petition to protest at their home lives being constantly disrupted by unsolicited sales pitches. In October last year, he presented a petition of almost 1,500 names direct to 10 Downing Street.

Mark also took residents' concerns directly to Maria Miller MP, then Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, both in person and in writing, and lent his backing to a Private Member's Bill on the issue put forward by a Lib Dem colleague. In March the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the Ministry of Justice introduced new rules in an attempt to address the issue of nuisance calls, lowering the threshold required for companies to be eligible for financial penalties.

Commenting after questioning the Prime Minister, Mark said:

'After the Government's announcements in March I had hoped we were beginning to turn the tide on these companies that believe they can disrupt people's lives as much as they wish with impunity. However I know from local residents and from my own experience that there is much work still to be done; I wanted to let the Prime Minister know that not only has the problem not been solved, but that this campaign will not end until nuisance calls are a thing of the past.'