Government warned for 3 years lending changes would create issues

[king1]

my bank is falling over its feet to give me money
but i have no mortgage or debt, that might be a factor.

I have no mortgage loan or debt, for decades have always paid my credit card balance in full when due, but about six months ago when I asked for a temporary increase in my credit card limit I was subjected to an extraordinarily intrusive interrogation.   First of all a phone conversation with someone who sounded about 15 and was reading from a script.   Then I had to send bank statements and tax records for the past year.  Then a further conversation in which I was accused of withholding information because "there is no record of your spending on clothes" ( I don't buy new clothes).   By that time I was so outraged that I just told her to forget it.

I completely understand that the legislation was aimed at protecting vulnerable people from predatory lenders, but it seems that either the banks have misinterpreted it or it was poorly written.

this does seem to suggest that the banks were tightening up the lending criteria a lot earlier than when the new laws came into force.
So maybe the government is just being made a scapegoat by/for the banks change in lending policy