A credit card cap is needed to protect "chronically broke" Britons struggling to make repayments on high interest loans, ministers have been told.

Labour's Stella Creasy warned that credit card firms were pushing millions into debt in the same way payday lenders did before action was taken to prevent anyone having to pay back more than double what they borrowed.

The Walthamstow MP made the comments as she moved an amendment to the Financial Guidance and Claims Bill which would require the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to take tougher action on credit card firms.

Ms Creasy, speaking in the Commons, said: "I want to urge the minister and urge the Government in my Cassandra-like way to learn the lessons of the payday lending industry in this country.

"I don't need to tell any member of this House that this is a nation drowning in debt.

"This nation owes more as individuals than we do as a Government, as a community we owed total household debt of £1.23 trillion in June 2016. That is more than the national debt that the Government has."

Ms Creasy said for many "there is simply too much month at the end of their money", adding: "Research now shows us that economic insecurity has become the new normal for at least 70% of the UK's working population who are described as chronically broke by the RSA."

The MP went on to praise the Government for action on payday lenders, but said the industry had merely "mutated" and now credit card firms were filling the gap left.

She said: "When the FCA did their survey into credit card debt, around 19% of consumers, so one in five, paid just the interest rather than the repayment charges, what we would call zombie debtors.

"They are stuck in debt because of their credit cards, little wonder the 40% of adults who say that they sometimes struggle to make it to payday, a third of them say it's because they're making credit card repayments in themselves.

"Debt is breeding debt is breeding difficulty is breeding debt again for them and their communities."