Mr. Paul Joyce:

The alternative repayment arrangements lenders offer under the code of conduct on mortgage arrears can be short term, long term, permanent, temporary and take many different forms such as payment of interest on a portion of capital, split mortgages, arrears capitalisation and so on. They are all subject though, by and large, to periodic reviews. Even where an arrangement is put in place by one lender who subsequently sells on its loan book, I do not see anything in the code of conduct on mortgage arrears that would stop the incoming purchaser from changing the goal posts at a financial review.

We do also have to remember the code of conduct on mortgage arrears is precisely that; it is a regulatory code. Its admissibility in legal proceedings is certainly open to question. It does not form any part of the corpus of secondary or primary legislation in the State. I would tend to say “No”. Once there are in-built reviews, even if the incoming purchaser were to honour the arrangement until the review, I do not see how they could be prevented from altering it after that.