Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the motion atá curtha chun tosaigh ag an nGrúpa Teicniúil i dtaobh an cheist rí-thábhachtach seo. Earlier this year members of the Joint Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, of which I am a member, helped to draft a report on what should be done to tackle our mortgage crisis. The report received all-party support and the support of the Independent Members on the committee. It was based on the engagement we had with all the players in the mortgage crisis, including the banks and those on the front line as well as submissions we received from people who have borne the brunt of the banks' attitudes. Regrettably, the Government has shown absolutely no desire to engage with the report or to implement its recommendations. It is clear from the Government amendment that it considers that this issue requires nothing more to be done. The motion put forward by the Technical Group includes some of the suggestions contained within that report.

The Government's attitude is an insult to the 90,000 families who were in mortgage arrears at the end of the second quarter of this year. The Government needs to wake up to the reality that the problem has not gone away. It may be decreasing but it has not gone away. The fact the Government is in its fourth year of office and there are so many people in mortgage arrears is an indictment of Government policy failure. The Government huffs and puffs at the banks for including evictions and so-called voluntary sales as solutions under the targets scheme, but the fact is those in Government have sat on their hands and allowed the banks to do this.

The Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, has made cheap shots across the floor of the finance committee. He said I have been scrambling around for four years to find case studies of people who have been evicted, but that is not the case. I explained to him I received a telephone call only two weeks ago from someone who had lost his home in County Roscommon. The person is homeless and had been living in emergency accommodation provided by the local authority for 14 days at that point. This was bed and breakfast and hotel accommodation. The person told me the council cannot afford to provide the service any longer and that the policy is only for provision for three days. The person did not know where to turn to, what to do and what not. That is the harsh reality for some people who find themselves in this situation.

The finance committee report requested that the Minister intervene to ensure the Central Bank does not accept kicking someone out of the home as a sustainable solution. The Government is sitting back and letting the mortgage crisis unwind itself regardless of how many families are left homeless. That is the only conclusion we can draw from the amendment tabled by the Government.

It is an indictment of the Government that it is leaving the heavy lifting to groups such as the Irish Mortgage Holders Organisation. I commend that organisation for its work and success, particularly with regard to the new figures it released yesterday for its engagement with AIB and also its engagement with other banks on behalf of people who find themselves in difficult situations.

The Technical Group's motion is correct that the code of conduct on mortgage arrears is not fit for purpose. Sinn Féin is aware of this, which is why we made a submission on the review of the code of conduct. I am glad that it has been acknowledged by the Technical Group. It is also the case that the legal status of the code of conduct is untested. It must be put on a statutory footing.

The motion calls on the banks to be required to offer one of a number of named solutions. I would go further and provide that before taking any legal action a bank should be required to offer each of the options available under the code of conduct, as requested in the committee's report. The committee's report also calls for clarity on the residual debt following a repossession or voluntary sale, something that is echoed in the motion before the House. For my party, that clarity should be a clean break from debt in the event of loss of a family home. Sinn Féin has written the legislation to allow this to happen. We brought it to the floor of the Dáil last year, but, again, the Government would not accept our proposal. This is the position every member of the finance committee has adopted, including Fine Gael and Labour Party Members, but it is clear that the Government and its Ministers are completely out of touch with their party members who understand what is happening on the ground and have spoken with one voice to have the issue addressed.

This week I have been contacted by a new batch of homeowners who are extremely worried that they have been left high and dry because their mortgages have been sold to vulture funds. These homeowners who had mortgages with Bank of Scotland are the latest group of people who are worried about their futures because their loans are now owned by vultures. I note that the heads of the long-promised Bill to regulate these funds have been put forward, but they are not with the finance committee. It is welcome that they have been brought forward, but why has there been such a delay in dealing with the issue? The delay in dealing with this urgent legislation is inexplicable. I again urge the Minister to prioritise it and bring it before the House as soon as possible.

This issue is being left on the long finger while people are worried and literally cannot sleep. I have pointed out time and again that this is not just a financial crisis for these individuals but a personal health crisis. People are simply at the end of their tether as a result of not knowing whether their homes, in which they have invested and reared their children, will be theirs tomorrow, the day after or the following day. They are pleading with the Government to do something, but, unfortunately, its proposed amendment to the motion is just an insult to them.

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