Are you over-indebted?

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In a scary move leading banks have signed up to a system developed by Callcredit which allocates scores to consumers based on what is termed their ‘over-indebtedness’.
The Department for Trade and Industry, which is now the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform, defined an individual as over-indebted if 25 per cent of their net monthly income was used to pay debt commitments.
Under the new system, which has been adopted by Halifax and Lloyds TSB, owned by Lloyds Banking Group, HSBC, and the Royal Bank of Scotland even prime borrowers with no history of defaulting could be rejected for a personal loan if their credit commitments take up too much of their income.
Funny it doesn’t seem too long ago that some of these organisations wanted you to have as much debt as possible regardless of your ability to repay – or did I misunderstand?