We the undersigned kindly ask Carol Vorderman to please stop doing adverts for secured loans.  Advertising works, that’s why companies pay for it, and over time her powerful adverts will have contributed to the growing normalization of this form of borrowing. We believe this is truly worrying, as secured loans should only ever be seen as loans of last resort.

With secured loans, failing to repay can result in losing your home or leave you locked into long term debts which means the overall interest cost is substantially increased. Rates are often higher than unsecured loans, and much higher than remortgages, which is one of the viable alternatives. Carol, we believe, that after nine years of linking yourself with these products, disengaging from the sales of these loans would be a real benefit to our increasingly debt ridden society.

We would also ask at this point that secured debt companies take a charter of responsible advertising that only targets those limited niche individuals who would actively benefit from secured debt; and that lowering monthly repayments, which in fact increases the cost of the loans because the interest is spread over a longer period, is never portrayed as saving people money.