Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

With respect, I disagree. The joint committee wrote to the Central Bank on foot of a request from the Irish Mortgage Holders Organisation asking it to carry out a system wide review. The Central Bank did this around this time last year. Four years prior to that, individuals were taking cases to the Financial Services Ombudsman and their cases were upheld.

Cases were taken to the High Court where they were also upheld, yet the Central Bank did nothing. When the case was before the Supreme Court the Central Bank said nothing publicly in regard to the issue. It was not the Central Bank that identified the problem. It never identified the issue even though hundreds of millions of euro were taken from customers. Customers identified the issue more than five years ago. They were forced to go through all the different systems and the Central Bank, which was supposed to protect the customer, regulate the banks properly and deal with inappropriate behaviour within the institutions did nothing publicly until last year. Serious questions arise. I do not direct what I say personally but at the institution. Given the situation from which we have emerged, I question the laissez-faireattitude to bankers stealing hundreds of millions of euro from their own customers, amounting to 9,000 individuals and, as a result, took homes from customers in some cases and bankrupted others. I have said that straight up to the bankers. It is absolutely appalling. The Central Bank did nothing until last year about the issue.

Questions must be asked. If memory serves me, approximately 86 cases were before the Financial Services Ombudsman and many others made requests. The Financial Services Ombudsman said it would wait until the Supreme Court made a decision on the test case before it. The situation dragged on for years. The Central Bank had the ability at any time during those years to step in and to give some protection to those individuals. It is the bankers who were responsible for the situation not the Central Bank but at any point during that period the Central Bank could have brought an end to the pain, suffering and mental health breakdowns that affected individuals. The Central Bank had the ability and responsibility to step in and demand that the banks would explain what was happening. Now we find that 9,000 individuals were dealt with by the banks in that way right across the system. All the banks made the same mistake. It was robbery and now it is dressed up as a redress scheme. It is like somebody burgling a house, taking a flat screen TV, getting caught and walking in the next day and saying "I'm sorry. Here is the redress scheme. I am giving you your flat screen TV back." That is what happened with the bankers. That is what they are doing. It is called something else because they are wearing pinstripe suits and doing it behind leather cushioned desks. The Central Bank had the responsibility and obligation to step in and deal with the situation five years ago not last year when it was asked to do so by this committee and by external groups acting on behalf of mortgage holders.