Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the delegates for their presentations. I do not want to repeat any of the questions already asked. However, there is one or two questions I would like to ask. Do the delegates ever have mystery shops or encourage banks to have mystery shops whereby they would pretend they are in the role of the person in debt and try to contact his or her lender?

I tried it last week, not in a personal capacity but for one of my constituents. I rang up to be told that there is no way to get through to the mortgage arrears department. One can only ring in but it cannot return a call. One cannot be put directly through but can only go through the main switch. It was one of the main banks the witnesses mentioned. I can talk to them about it later. I found it amazing that six times I tried to get through. I came at it from different angles but at no stage could I make contact.

SFSs require people to do not just one run but numerous trial runs. Communications is poor in terms of lenders going back to the persons in question. On the voluntary sector, I think it is amazing that people in dire distress are told to go to the voluntary sector for advice. That is what I picked up. How is the federation going to accommodate and support those in arrears? The witnesses are dead right that we all have a role to play, be it Oireachtas Members, county councils, planners or banks, but I wonder is the federation going to go back to its members and tell them to bring a halt to this for the next six months and deal with the housing crisis. Will the witnesses ask the banks to please stop issuing letters and deal with what is there at the moment?

How many are three months, six months, nine months and over 12 months in arrears, respectively? How many are €5,000, €10,000, €20,000 and €30,000 in arrears, respectively? They are the people who are the pin of their collars. They are the people who are working day and night to try to make it. The person I was dealing with last week was €30,000 in arrears and was hit with a High Court summons for her property to be taken from her. I found it amazing that she was €30,000 in arrears but when she tried to make numerous phone calls, including with my help, it was to no avail.

That is my story on this. There is a lot there to be digested. The federation represents numerous banks and should have empathy. As Deputy Durkan said earlier, the banks were supported in the past and it is now time for the federation to show empathy to the householder in distress without fuelling a crisis that is already in disarray.