This came after new research published by the Financial Regulator showed that 300,000 people were reported to be happy paying interest rates of up to 188% to moneylenders.

The report recommended more transparency and education but came out against a cap on interest rates.

The Consumers Association of Ireland strongly disagrees with the lack of a cap, which it says increases our attraction to sub-prime lenders, who target cash-strapped people with easy loans at high interest rates.

"If anything, this report shows the need [for a cap on rates]. Most of these people in it (71%) are not even aware what interest rates they are on, " says Dermott Jewell, chief executive of the Consumers Association of Ireland.

He says Ireland is "wide-open" to sub-prime lenders, several of which have recently launched here despite the collapse of the much larger subprime loan market in the US.

Jewell also takes issue with the apparently soft line on moneylending in the research commissioned by the Financial Regulator. It makes no mention of the hardship caused to families who get in over their heads.

However, it does put the number of those who have difficulty making repayments at 16% . . . or 48,000 people.

"They [moneylenders] complain about the 'rising cost of business'.

God love them! They can't make a profit on 188% interest!" he says.

Jewell dismisses the report's suggestion that moneylending can be a "service" that provides "financial inclusion" to borrowers.

"Those days are long gone, " he says, advising people in financial trouble not to borrow money, least of all at very high interest rates.

Jewell is amazed that most people saw the moneylender as a "friend" and "trust them a lot more than banks". Some moneylenders might be cashing in on a need for social contact from some isolated and "confused" consumers, he suggests.

A spokeswoman for the Financial Regulator stressed that the report was a "starting point" in its ongoing research into a complex industry, over which it assumed responsibility in 2003. "We're not here to defend the industry. This is a first stepf We're looking at gaps in protection, " she said.

The research involved 333 borrowers, 45 moneylenders and 17 offices of the Money Advice and Budgeting Service (MABS). Discussions also took place with MABS and the moneylenders' representative body.