Mr. Simon Crone:

To respond to Deputy Barry's second question, he is correct that €20,000 would be maximum claim amount in the example he gave and his understanding on that is correct. We are supportive of transparency. There is nothing to hide in what we are trying to promote. For example, in Finland the cost of the mortgage insurance is laid out and the borrower sees it transparently and it can also be capitalised into the loan and can get spread over a cost rather the borrower having to come up with, say, €2,000 in the example I mentioned. We would support such transparency. As Mr. Bennett mentioned, we do due diligence up front and then we do ongoing due diligence to make sure that the quality of underwriting prudencies continued to be applied and that the valuation standards are high.

On regional caps, we would support something like that. The house prices required for first time buyers in Dublin with the commensurate affordability and prudency that is applied is different from perhaps other parts of the country and so a different level may be suitable for different parts of the country. We agree that we would work with both State and privately owned organisations and we would not treat them any differently. They would need to have the right capabilities to do prudent levels of underwriting and we believe that exists today in Ireland. Those are answers to a few of the Deputy's questions.