Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Wednesday, 31 October 2012
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform
Operations and Functioning of AIB: Discussion
2:05 pm
Mr. David Duffy:
Are we putting a margin around those current lending products? We are putting average assumptions around a portfolio, so we are not modelling current distress into margins for an investor. That is absolutely not the case. We are assuming we can solve our distress issues and rebuild a stable and normal bank and we are offering that as a proposition to investors. It is a very different issue.
In regard to the distress in mortgages today, we are looking at all debt, and not just mortgages on their own, and at the sustainability of that debt. We are being explicit about the difference. There will not be debt forgiveness. Maybe this is semantics for some people but it is a hugely important issue. There will be debt restructuring where there is compromise on both sides at the end of a process of discussion. As I said, there are three parts to this. We will immediate try to stabilise. The reality is we are all human beings and people are lying awake at night in distress. We will stabilise the situation to prevent that from becoming another problem. We will identify what is a sustainable amount of debt. Both parties, following discussion, will decide the amount of debt that is affordable. We will deal with and address the rest of that debt and, in most cases, do some structural write off. Those are the challenges we face and the actions we will take.
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