MALG Conference 2025 Session Synopses
Also see the Programme and Speakers.
Keynote Speaker: Lee Healey, IncomeMAX (sponsored by Bristow & Sutor)
Evolving Together: The Cost of Life – and Why Your Work Matters
The storms keep coming. Costs rise, systems strain, and yet amidst it all, our community continues to help vulnerable people stand. In this keynote, Lee Healey invites us to look beyond statistics and see the real story – the cost of life, the courage it takes to live it – and why the work we do together really matters.
It’s a story of progress made, and the danger of forgetting how far we’ve come. It’s a call to action and a reminder to never stop believing in each other. Through awareness of what the cost of life really means for millions, we can keep building the kind, compassionate, and empowering systems that protect people through life’s continual storms.
Evolving together is always about change – but it’s also about remembering the shared humanness that has carried us safely this far.
Regulatory Keynote: ‘Fireside Chat’ with Alison Walters, Financial Conduct Authority
A Q&A with the FCA’s Director of Consumer Finance, Supervision, Policy & Competition on how the regulator is helping consumers navigate their financial lives.
Breakout 1a: The Changing Nature of Public Sector Debt Collection: Considering Ability to Pay
As public expectations and policy priorities evolve, so too must the approach to debt collection in the public sector. This session will explore how central and local government bodies are rethinking enforcement, ability to pay assessments, and vulnerability safeguards in the context of debts owed to the state.
With increasing recognition of the need to assess ability to pay fairly and consistently, this session will bring together experts from government, the debt advice sector, and enforcement to discuss emerging good practice, data sharing, and the balance between recovery and support.
Speakers will reflect on how ability to pay frameworks—such as the Standard Financial Statement (SFS)—are used (or not), how payment offers are handled, and what reforms may be needed to improve outcomes for financially vulnerable people while maintaining public revenue integrity.
Breakout 1b: Fintech Showcase: Innovative and Cutting-Edge Solutions for Supporting Financial Resilience and Financial Capability
From open banking to digital ID, from mobile wallets to improved online platforms; Fintech had led the way in the use of technology to drive, enhance and elevate financial resilience and capability as well as providing groundbreaking new ways to help advice agencies and the people they support. This session will provide an exciting opportunity for participants to hear from leading Fintech companies, to learn, engage and probe their new and exceptional innovations which drive financial inclusion and aim to make financial processes more efficient, accessible and user-friendly.
MALG Podcast LIVE: Liz Barclay, Institute of Directors
Synopsis coming soon.
Breakout 2a: Financial Inclusion: Rebuilding Creditworthiness after Economic Abuse and other Financial Difficulties
With economic abuse now recognised in law and the coercive and controlling behaviour offence introduced, now is the time for the money advice and credit sector to offer practical support which helps victim-survivors to rebuild their lives. As evidenced by Surviving Economic Abuse’s Expert by Experience Group, when victim-survivors don’t have access to money or financial services, they can remain trapped in an abusive situation or, if they have left, forced to return to their abuser. Equally, abusers can turn financial services into tools of harm, even after the victim-survivor has fled. This session will provide the opportunity for participants to hear first-hand accounts of the impact of economic abuse from our Experts by Experience as well as from a panel of professionals from the money advice, charity and credit reference sectors on what they are doing to tackle economic abuse and its after effects.
Breakout 2b: MALG Members Friday Forum LIVE: The Future of Consumer Protection (sponsored by PRA Group)
Take part in this in-person version of the virtual MALG Friday Forum, which was launched at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic to enable ‘working together to improve the lives of people in debt’ during lockdown, and is still going strong today. With a general focus on the future of consumer protection, the floor will be open for group discussion, challenging questions, and joint solutions. Led by industry experts, attendees will get the opportunity to discuss what the perfect debt policy landscape would look like. ‘Raise your hand’, don’t ‘go on mute’ and get ‘in the chat’ in this interactive session!
Better Together: Artificial Intelligence – Technology in Tandem with Humans
Bringing everyone together for the end of day interactive session in the main Banking Hall to explore how AI could impact the future of debt advice. Our expert panel will discuss what the rapid growth of AI could mean for the debt sector and consider the potential impact on people’s jobs along with considerations for clients and customers.
The panel will explore the effectiveness of existing AI projects and why some are more impactive than others. We will also consider different ways of working and what approaches can make a real difference. Is there a clear recipe for success or do organisations need to adopt alternative approaches to gain competitive advantage?