Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

We should leave bedfellows out of this. I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate. The motion tabled by my colleague, Deputy Michael McGrath, calls for a serious debate that can allow us to identify solutions to the crisis of mortgage arrears. As others have noted, there is no distilled wisdom or solution on any of the benches of this House. I hope we can have a reasonable debate that allows people to bring forward ideas. All of us deal with this issue in our constituency offices. The names and amounts vary but the principle is the same. People are unable to meet the payments demanded from them by their financial institutions.

The State has recapitalised the banks so that they are in a position to deal with the crisis. If further capitalisation is required we should address that issue, but we must begin from the premise that a viable and sustainable economy cannot be created if we burden people with unmanageable debt. There is an onus on all of us to find a solution to that problem. The first approach should not involve taking a house from such an individual. I take Deputy Maloney's point about the emotive language of eviction and agree it is overused by some. However, it is a real and significant fear for the people who present to my office on a weekly basis. While they are attempting to pay what they owe, they are not real participants in our economy.

They are not living; they are barely surviving, and in some cases the basics in the household are not provided and children are not appropriately dressed or fed. This is a striking situation to which we must find a resolution. I believe the only way to do this is that set out in our motion, which is a legislative approach. I will not get into tit-for-tat, but the Government made many promises prior to coming into office and has made many promises since. At the time it was going through the House we stated that the insolvency legislation would not work, and I do not believe it will. Last week an insolvency practitioner clearly indicated that from his perspective people would be treated differently based on their class in society. It is an appalling vista if the legislation brought forward by the Government allows this to happen. What is critical is to have an independent arbiter between the borrower and the lender with a set of rigorous guidelines, set down by legislation if necessary, who succeeds in arbitrating effectively between both sides and brings forward a solution which is fair to the individual concerned, the financial institution and, ultimately, the taxpayer, but which is also consistent. We cannot have a somebody getting a better deal because he or she lives on the right side of the road or happens to be from a particular professional class and therefore an accommodation is better for such a person than it is for a blue-collar worker. We cannot allow this to happen in a democracy.

Of course banks must be profitable, and they will be. For a cohort of people this is a real crisis, but there are others, such as younger people coming into the labour market, for whom this will not be a problem. Property is much cheaper and they will borrow in a completely different environment. They will provide an adequate resource for these financial institutions to get back on their feet. We must have a suite of measures which manages the bubble in the middle which needs to be solved. It is only with viable families - living appropriately, paying their way and managing their budgets - that ultimately we will have a viable economy. It is incumbent on all of us to try to find a resolution.

As a member of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform I listened to some of the bankers, and I am concerned that they are overly profit-driven. It is true that financial institutions need to reach a break-even point, but some of those in the upper echelons of the banks came in when the banks were broke and they are trying to resolve the balance sheet while aiming towards a bonus when they get the banks back to the marketplace. This should not be the immediate requirement of the State. Of course the banks should be brought to a break-even point, but this should be done in a way that meets the needs of those who have borrowed to an extent they cannot pay back. We must resolve this, but it must be sustainable. We cannot just look at getting banks back to a good shareholder position.

I would like to share my final two minutes with Deputy Peter Mathews.

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