Spotlight: Paramilitary loan sharks targeting food bank users

Food bank users in Northern Ireland are being targeted by paramilitary loan sharks, a BBC NI Spotlight investigation has learned.

Victims of illegal money lenders told the programme how they faced a cycle of spiralling debt and intimidation.

One man who spoke to the programme anonymously said loan sharks cold-called him and gave him a £500 loan after seeing him at a food bank.

A month later he was told he owed them £1,300.

A representative of the UK's largest food bank charity said similar accounts had been relayed to him of people who have been using their services because of hardship being approached by loan sharks.

Jonny Currie, the head of the Trussell Trust in Northern Ireland, said: "That's certainly something that food banks and the network have reported back to us - folks that are referred to them have said they are part of that illegal system.

"These are illegal money lenders, criminal gangs, paramilitary organisations, whatever you want to call them, in those local communities, that are preying on people who are in crisis."

Mr Currie said more people were turning to the illegal money lenders for small loans to cover basic essentials including weekly energy top-ups and groceries.

"It could be £50, it could be £100. So small amounts of money that are really part of what is your essential week to be able to get by," he added.

The man who spoke to Spotlight said he had turned to a local food bank after he had lost his job and his benefits were cut.

He spoke anonymously to the programme out of fear for his personal safety.

"I got a knock at the door, there's these two young men telling me things that they shouldn't have been able to tell me," he said.

"They knew I needed money, they knew I was struggling and they knew when I got paid my universal credits, they knew the dates of when I'd be paid, and they said they could help me out."

The man recognised one of the loan sharks. He said he had seen him sitting in a car outside the food bank as he and others queued up to get help.

He reported the incident to the police who investigated it and took a statement.

Det Supt Emma Neill said victims who came to the police had done the right thing

He said he was advised by friends that local loyalist paramilitaries were best placed to sort out the problem since the loan sharks had been identified as coming from outside the community.

He told Spotlight: "It's their area, they control it and somebody else had walked in and done this. I was told in no uncertain terms: 'Keep your mouth shut. This is sorted. You have to pay the £500.'

"So I paid another two."

Det Supt Emma Neill, from the Organised Crime branch, said: "I can understand your victim's concern for his safety and he did the right thing in reporting the matter to the police.

"Absolutely I would encourage anybody to come forward. But by engaging in that type of arrangement, what you are doing is perpetuating the coercive control that these paramilitary organised crime groups have on our community."

Clergyman Brian Anderson from East Belfast Mission runs services to help people who have become victims of loan sharks

The BBC Spotlight programme also features a woman from a loyalist area who said vulnerable women in her community were being coerced into criminality because they were being forced to pay off loans using their own prescription drugs as well as cash.

"They're paying with their medication. It's almost like well you've got a bit of an asset and we want it. It's a criminal offence, but yeah, they are desperate," she said.

Security and community sources told Spotlight that paramilitary loan sharks exist in all communities where there is poverty - but they say the problem is most widespread and acute in loyalist urban areas.

Clergyman Brian Anderson is chairman of the East Belfast Mission, which runs services to help people who have become victims of paramilitary loan sharks.

"People are struggling to make ends meet," he said.

"I would notice particularly that the benefits that would last a fortnight, are now only lasting a week to 10 days.

"We will help them with food, with gas and electricity and we'll do all we can to provide places where you can come and be warm and spend time with us.

"But that's utter pressure. That's a mental pressure to live with day in daily."

You can watch BBC NI Spotlight's Loan Sharks and Paramilitaries on BBC iPlayer