Call for ban on cold calling to protect the vulnerable

POLICE officers are calling for a government ban on “cold calling” by tradesmen offering building and gardening work to residents on their doorsteps.

A motion at this week’s Scottish Police Federation conference in Aviemore from the Strathclyde joint branch board calls on the Scottish Government to create legislation to prevent the practice. It says some cold callers charge “very inflated prices for very little or substandard work which usually costs thousands of pounds to repair”.

The motion goes on: “The targeted victims of this type of crime are mainly elderly people who are sometimes conned out of tens of thousands of pounds per job.

“This crime is very hard to prove and obtain convictions for and most that are convicted continue in this line of profitable crime.”

The motion says a change in the law would “assist the police to obtain convictions and also make it harder for the criminals to operate as freely”.

Senior Tory MSP Murdo Fraser backed the demand from rank-and-file police officers and called on ministers to consider their proposals to “provide protection to the vulnerable.

Mr Fraser said: “This is something that needs to be looked at very seriously, as many older and vulnerable people feel pressured on the doorstep into buying goods and services that they don’t actually want.

“The Scottish Government needs to take a close look at this proposal and see whether the existing rules are sufficient to provide protection to the vulnerable.”