Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)

I apologise if I left out Deputy Ó Fearghaíl on a very important issue such as this. I am sure Deputy Kelleher enjoyed being in the House. He used that euphemism. He was not in this Chamber in so far as he had a criticism to voice. Those of us who wanted to address this issue had every opportunity to do so this morning in this Chamber. If he wants to make silly political charges to get himself some personal headline, perhaps he should do so on an issue to which he intends to contribute and has something serious to say.

I do not think these charges, coming from a member of Fianna Fáil, have any credibility whatsoever. Fianna Fáil in Government from 2002 onwards - there was a different ethic in the Fianna Fáil Party before then - crushed any Private Members' Bill that was proposed. After 2002, that party ruled in arrogance and in ignorance. It became impossible for any Member of the House to progress constructively a single Private Members' Bill. That was quite different before 2002. I published many Bills myself before that date and four of them were enacted simply as Private Members' Bills. Over 20 others that I published were not immediately accepted by the Government, but within 12 to 18 months they led to Government legislation that substantially reflected the Private Members' Bills. That ceased to be the case from 2002. I was out of the House from 2002 to 2007. After 2007, instead of dealing constructively or decently with Private Members' Bills proposed by the Opposition and without acknowledging that Deputies had a genuine interest in issues and were bringing forward constructive proposals to facilitate their discussion, Fianna Fáil Ministers, along with Ministers from the Progressive Democrats and the Green Party, tended to denigrate personally the individuals who brought measures forward before they dealt with any analysis of the Bill.

I welcome today's initiative and I welcome the discussion on it. I do not believe that it helps the House if, in order to get silly personal political headlines, some Members of this House seek to undermine the reforms rather than build on them, and seek to make the sort of charges that Deputy Kelleher made on an issue that he does not deem sufficiently serious for himself to enter the House and debate.

Members of this House should not opt into the corrosive cynicism about the manner in which we conduct our business that is constantly articulated by sections and individuals in the media. Instead of addressing the serious substance of major issues affecting this country, many of those who write some of these stories seem to spend their time phoning Deputies to check where they are, carry out completely irrelevant surveys or constantly table Freedom of Information requests on a broad range of issues that they could research themselves if they had any initiative.

I fully accept that this Bill was well intended. I know that the New Beginning organisation would have been of some assistance to Deputy Donnelly when drafting the Bill. The group has taken up the cudgels on behalf of individuals who are in mortgage difficulties and I think they have been of assistance in highlighting that issue and helping some individuals. Relevant Departments have engaged with some of the members of that organisation in helping to frame legislation. I am looking forward to any engagement I may have with the group on the insolvency Bill.

I want to invite Deputies to respond to the heads of the insolvency Bill. If it is not possible for Members of either House to attend the justice committee meetings, constructive proposals to feed into the development of the full Bill are welcome. I want to encourage them and I am looking forward to receiving proposals from Members of this House and those outside the House so we can meet our deadline on 30 April. I ask those who want to contribute to do so by 1 March, because serious work has to be done to the Bill by the Office of the Attorney General so it can be published in proper legislative form.

The central purpose of the Bill is to try to ensure that where people are in financial difficulties, they can rely upon a non-judicial debt resolution process instead of bankruptcy proceedings. Its very availability should encourage financial institutions which are not dealing reasonably with people to behave reasonably, given the difficulty that could arise for them should insolvency proceedings be initiated. Nobody wants to be declared bankrupt or insolvent and go through a court process. We need to put in place a range of options in our policy framework and our legal architecture to help people in that respect.

The people for whom we have the most sympathy are those who are leading ordered lives and who did not borrow excessively, but who find themselves in unexpected financial difficulties as a consequence of the economic collapse that has affected this country and the unexpected loss of their jobs or businesses that they were running and which provided employment to others. During the property boom, many people purchased properties at exorbitant prices and did so in good faith, believing that if they did not get on the property ladder, they would never purchase their own home. They now find themselves in substantial difficulties.

My Government colleagues and I remain deeply concerned to promote measures to alleviate as far as possible the difficulties experienced by home owners in repaying mortgage debt. The budget last December contained measures in respect of increased mortgage interest relief for those home owners who bought their properties in the most recent years at the peak of the boom and who have been worst hit. The code of conduct on mortgage arrears is being applied by the financial institutions in their dealings with those in mortgage arrears and is being monitored by the Central Bank.

Significant progress has already been achieved by the interdepartmental steering group in a number of important areas following the Keane report. The Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government has reached an advanced stage in the development of a pilot mortgage to rent scheme. In addition, the Central Bank is engaging with licensed mortgage providers in the development of mortgage arrears resolution strategies and plans which will ensure mortgage providers have real options for borrowers experiencing significant repayment difficulty. The proposed personal insolvency arrangement in the insolvency law reforms provides an innovate approach to the settlement of unsustainable secured credit such as a mortgage. Taken together, all of these measures will provide hope and assistance to homeowners in difficulty.

Despite the genuine difficulties being experienced in making mortgage repayments by many people, the number of home repossession orders made by our courts is relatively small. The number of repossession cases in the High Court, both new cases and orders, showed a decrease in 2011 from 2010, contrary to public perception. New cases for possession of all types of real property in the High Court dropped from 583 in 2010 to 480 in 2011. High Court orders for possession of all types of real property decreased from 326 in 2010 to 281 in 2011. It is the case that Circuit Court orders for possession showed an increase in 2011 by 47 to 353, of which 289 were residential and 64 non-residential. However, adding the overall figures together, fewer orders for repossession were made in 2011 than in 2010.

I share the Deputy's undoubted concern about individuals and families who, due to their individual financial circumstances, are experiencing difficulty in discharging their home loan repayment obligations. However, enacting a Bill which requires the courts to consider unnecessary, unworkable and constitutionally flawed factors in determining home repossession applications will not improve matters. The unfortunate reality is that the Bill could make matters worse rather than better. It is important that we find the correct balance between the interests of the homeowner and those of the financial institution and unfortunately the Bill does not do so.

The issues involved here are undoubtedly varied and complex. We must not be led into believing there are easy solutions. We must also bear in mind our consideration of the reform of the law in regard to personal insolvency does not take place in dealing with what could be described as a normal economic context. This was an issue to which special regard had to be given in the drafting of the heads of the insolvency Bill. What we are doing in addressing the necessary law reforms is trying to come to terms with the consequences - this is particularly relevant today - of an easy credit fuelled property boom, bubble and bust. The banking system had to be rescued from collapse and is now primarily in State ownership and largely dependent on continuing financial support from the European Central Bank.

Deputies should take these wider external circumstances into consideration in contemplating solutions to this very difficult problem. We cannot allow ourselves to be seduced into believing, however much we sympathise with the plight of persons struggling to deal with over-indebtednesses, that there are simple measures that can be taken that will deal with the problem. There are no back of the envelope solutions, nor is there any magic bullet. All solutions will have significant consequences and potential costs. What is needed in the context of the difficulties faced by homeowners is a range of possible measures which offer individuals in financial difficulties the possibility of remaining in their home, postponing mortgage payments, where appropriate, and allowing them some space to discharge other debts they may have where there is a realistic possibility, if given a reasonable period of time, that they may be able to work themselves out of their debts and retain their home. No one on any side of the House wants individuals who are in temporary financial difficulties, through no fault of their own, being put out of reasonable family homes and having their homes repossessed. Not only is it not in the interests of individuals and families that this occur but the financial institutions cannot, in the long-term, benefit to any degree if tens of thousands of homes are repossessed. Clearly, this has been understood by the financial institutions given the number of repossession orders that have been effected.

I thank Deputy Donnelly again for producing the Bill. From past experience, I know drafting Private Members' Bills is not an easy job. In the context of the Deputy spending his first year in the House, one has to learn to come to terms with the technical issues that must be addressed, the manner in which courts may apply legislation containing basic principles, the extent to which judicial discretion should be left to the courts and the extent to which principles prescribed are workable in circumstances where an add-on structure is not in place for them. The approach of the Government, in the context of Deputy Donnelly's Bill and any other Private Members' Bill, is not to adopt the approach of Governments previously led by the Fianna Fáil Party in the years I described. That approach was to not try to assist-----

See this speech in context