© Matthew Buck Hack Cartoons

Former Oil Executive and new Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby plans to bring the Church of England into competition with the burgeoning short term borrowing industry.

The context for this eye catching event is the legacy of private debt in the UK – this has been typically estimated to be five times as big as the public debt which preoccupies the chancellor of the exchequer George Osborne.

The problem of credit and debt appears to be being passed away from the banks which cannot, it appears, be entirely trusted with attending to our personal and business borrowing needs.

Interestingly, Archbishop Welby also recently had a role as a member of the Parliamentary commission into banking standards.

Updated 26th July: By 7pm on the day the Archbishop went public with his thoughts (following the interview with Total Politics Magazine) The Financial Times discovered that The Church of England has investment in a third-party who fund Wonga.com.

The inevitable ‘public embarrassment’ interview was conducted on the Radio 4 Today programme this morning. You can read some of the listeners responses here.