Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

We were not asking them to input into the policy underpinning the scheme. We were inquiring as to how mortgages operated in practice and how this could fit into their practice of lending as part of the deposit in accordance with the prudential requirements of the Central Bank. Again, the advice of the Central Bank to move the mortgage threshold from 80% down to 70% was to widen it. The arguments used were that the Central Bank did not want to incentivise unnecessary borrowing on behalf of borrowers because it formed the opinion that if it was left at 80% people who did not require that level of mortgage would borrow at that level of mortgage simply to avail of the tax rebate. Since the average was lower, 70% was more appropriate, but it has the effect, as the Deputy said, of widening the scheme, not of narrowing it.