Should we blame the players in the financial sector for making it too easy to get our hands on their money?

Or should the Government and the Bank of England play a more leading role in making sure that neither we nor the financial institutions get their fingers burned?

Everyone knows someone with a cautionary tale to tell. We all know people who appear to live way beyond their means.

And we all know people who appear to spend money merely for the sake of spending it. But how far do you take it?

It clearly has to be up to the individual, but the temptations are, quite frankly, too tempting. As many of my friends testify, it is possible to live on "plastic" without ever paying interest.

Swopping and changing cards to take advantage of the "interest free" periods is a great game to play. But it is a game that has to be played carefully.

My letterbox might have healed up as far as the recent council elections were concerned. But it is always open to those who bombard me with offers of credit cards, loans, consolidation plans, mortgages – yes, there really are some out there – and other financial deals.

A couple of years ago, I started keeping track of just how many I had received in roughly the first 50 days of the year.

When I totted it up, I realised I should have been living on a desert island with £300,000 in my back pocket!

Clearly, I did not take advantage of all, or indeed any, of those offers. But there are people out there who do, and not all of them appear to be stupid.

I have met people with 10 or a dozen credit cards with combined credit limits well into six figures. That is not a place where I would ever want to be.

And as it gets harder and harder to service those sorts of debts, who is to blame? Have we, as the general public, been too greedy with our need for credit? Should we blame the players in the financial sector for making it too easy to get our hands on their money?

Or should the Government and the Bank of England play a more leading role in making sure that neither we nor the financial institutions get their fingers burned?