Mr. Richie Boucher:

I cannot speak for the other banks but I am not sure that all of them are providing split mortgages. A split mortgage is one of a range of resolutions and the number of them is relatively small. However, Bank of Ireland has provided two thirds of the split mortgages. I can confirm, based on figures received last night, that during the month of July, Bank of Ireland put another 100 split mortgage accounts on the books. The number is increasing, therefore. From our perspective, we have to consider a wide range of options and issues. We have to bear in mind that any forbearance is a cost to the bank. If we do not receive amortisation or we agree to warehouse amortisation, we have to fund that in the market by raising deposits. If we consider Bank of Ireland in its own right and compare our arrears with the industry average, each of the banks has to deal with different issues.

In Bank of Ireland's case, for owner-occupiers, our arrears are 53%. We have to bear in mind the cost of the provision of forbearance. One cannot look at it in isolation. If we do not recover the cost, we will not have the capital to lend into the economy or the income to repay and reward taxpayers. All of these things have to be taken into consideration. The vast bulk of our default customers are on tracker mortgages. We provided this information for the market at the end of August. The average yield or all-in rate associated with our tracker mortgage book - this relates to owner-occupiers - is 155 basis points. Other than in exceptional circumstances, we do not believe a restructure is possible if the customer cannot meet the full interest on the mortgage. We are prepared to bear the cost of warehousing. That is the rationale. I ask the committee to note the level of restructuring we offer. We were able to offer a restructuring option on foot of 80% of the standard financial statements we assessed during July.