Aideen Hayden (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for being here and for their excellent work. We all agree that without their services we would be in a much more difficult position. I refer to the document MABS gave us, it which it is stated that MABS completed 5,481 standard financial statements on behalf of clients in the period July to December 2013. Out of those, 2,301 - 42% - were subsequently queried by the lenders. It went into a bit of detail as to what it regarded as the vulnerability of its clients and some of the strategies in which banks engaged, including telephoning them. The implication seemed to be that MABS was regarded as being "too soft" in the preparation of the standard financial statement. The document suggested that MABS was queried on, for example, the costs it included for third level education, child care, lifestyle and entertainment, utilities and so forth. What I took from this document, which I would like MABS to confirm, is that vulnerable people were being picked on and telephoned when they did not have advice available to them and after completing a standard financial statement with the assistance of MABS in a manner which it regarded as being fair and which would have set out the expenditure it regarded as reasonable. However, that was being picked apart in what I would regard as a disgusting fashion. Will MABS comment on that?