Ms Noeline Blackwell:

Let me go back briefly to the AIB solution with the IMHO. Whatever the bank's motives, it is in its interest to have a system in place where the borrower is well advised in his dealings with the bank. In FLAC, we have consistently made the case that we just speak about the consumer experience. We have never said the State should write off any of the consumer's debt or that one solution should fit all. That is not our area. What we know is that it does not require this.

Between the six organisations, we deal with only a tiny portion of those in distress, but there are fair solutions available. There are solutions that will suit most cases, short of an overblown solution that might be thought to put the State banks at risk.

None of that is in our knowledge, certainly not in FLAC's knowledge. However, if the needs of the consumer had been placed slightly more to the fore and if what the Minister had said in March 2013, when he was announcing the targets, that people would be facilitated to come to fair and decent solutions with their lenders, then there would be no need for some sort of a major solution, because most of them can be settled with a proper structure that gives some equity and some justice to the borrowers.