Commentary on Sections Schedule 27 - Minor and consequential amendments Paragraphs 50 and 51 - Consumer Credit Act 1974 (c. 39)
957.Section 165(3) of the Consumer Credit Act 1974 states that a person cannot be required to answer any question or give any information if to do so might incriminate that person or (where that person is married) the husband or wife of that person.Paragraph 50 extends this provision, so that there is no requirement to answer questions or provide information where to do so might incriminate the person’s civil partner.
958.Part II of the Consumer Credit Act (CCA) 1974 classifies consumer credit and consumer hire agreements. The term “associate” appears in the provisions defining a number of these transactions: running-account and fixed–sum credit (section 10); small agreements (section 17); and linked transactions (section 19).
959.Part III of the CCA 1974 deals with the principles of licensing. Section 25 sets out various matters which should be taken into account by the Office of Fair Trading in deciding whether an applicant is a fit person to carry on licensed activities. One of these is the conduct not only of the applicant but of, amongst others, the applicant’s associates.
960.The word “associate” is defined in section 184 of the CCA 1974 and embraces certain forms of business association and relatives. “Relative” is defined in subsection (5) and includes former and reputed husbands and wives and children born outside wedlock, step-children and adopted children.
961.Paragraph 51 extends the meaning of “associate” to civil partners and to those relationships created by the formation of a civil partnership, which mirror those created by marriage. It extends the definition of “relative” at subsection (5) to include former civil partners, and also, for the purposes of the subsection, allows that a relationship will be established as if any illegitimate child, step-child or adopted child had been a child born within a civil partnership, as well as in wedlock.