Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Great. This is important because it is a nice gateway to the next issue I wish to raise. I wish to continue on an issue raised by Deputy Pearse Doherty. As the delegates will see on the screen, the Personal Insolvency Bill is making its way through its Final Stages and we will vote on it this evening. I regret that I will vote against it, having supported the Minister for Justice and Equality, Deputy Alan Shatter, the whole way through. One of the reasons I have decided to vote against it - I made the decision today - is that Mr. Richie Boucher said yesterday that within the context of the personal insolvency legislation there would be no debt forgiveness. Mr. MacSharry has also said there will be no debt forgiveness. We will not be writing off any debt. I appreciate the semantics between writing off debt and debt forgiveness and know no insult was intended. As I find the phrase "debt forgiveness" insulting, I would like to use the phrase "debt surrender".

Let us take an example, which I find it is usually the best way to clarify these issues.

Let us take the example of a Permanent TSB borrower who borrowed €400,000, whose property is now worth €200,000 and the change in her circumstances means she can now service a mortgage of €250,000, capital and interest. The specific intent of the legislation making its way through the Chamber and on which I am about to go and contribute, is that Permanent TSB would surrender €150,000 worth of debt in the case of that borrower. In other words, it would say to her that for, say, a three-year period it would leave her with enough to have a reasonable standard of living, it would take the rest and at the end of the three-year period her mortgage would not be €400,000 it would be €250,000. That is the intention of the legislation and that, by the way, is in the public interest. Unless I misinterpreted what Mr. MacSharry said, what I heard him say is the bank's position - he used worrying phrases such as "we in the bank" - is a very different interpretation of how that example would work through. Can he explain to the committee how he would see Permanent TSB engaging with that example?