Misleading discounts and obstructive cancellation procedures certainly deserve regulation. But presenting this as a significant response to the cost of living crisis feels like rearranging the cushions while the sofa is on fire (Subscriptions you can’t easily cancel, sales that aren’t sales – I’ll end the rip-offs that British people hate, 9 August).
For millions of households, the problem is not finding the “unsubscribe” button. It is finding that £50 buys remarkably little at the supermarket, while housing and essential bills consume ever more of their income.
Perhaps this is merely the appetiser and something considerably more substantial is coming for the main course. I sincerely hope so. Otherwise, perhaps ministers could extend their new consumer-friendly approach to democracy: one-click cancellation for political subscriptions that no longer offer value for money.
Fernando Quintana Marrero
London
The issue that Andy Burnham intends to address stems from what Cory Doctorow has described as “enshittification” – that is, the intentional process of making tech services worse to increase profits once customers are hooked in.
The PM needs to be careful not to end up sweating the small stuff and finding that all efforts are futile as his government’s apparent fixation with the likes of Palantir and desire to build more and more datacentres creates a dependency on foreign corporations that undermines our economic, environmental and national security, and the only jobs that arise are for serfs in the warehouses and delivery vans of the techno-feudal overlords.
Dave Hunter
Bristol
“Every ‘sale’ seems to come with an asterisk,” writes Andy Burnham. Was your inclusion of a large asterisk next to his name at the bottom of the article in the print edition a cheeky nod to a sales pitch by the PM?
Thomas Ryder
Nottingham
Maybe Andy Burnham should look at the practice, used by energy companies, of “standing charges”?
Dougie Firth
London
How about ending the scandal of the rip-off student loan scheme?
Richard Hollis
St Albans
