Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 16 January 2018

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach

Tracker Mortgages: Discussion

2:00 pm

Photo of John McGuinnessJohn McGuinness (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I will touch on the Consumer Protection (Regulation of Credit Servicing Firms) Act 2015. One of the modules we intend to touch on will be on how banks and vulture funds are dealing with loans in the SME sector. The financial ombudsman is prohibited from dealing with a case which involves an SME with a turnover of more than €3 million. In Europe, an SME is considered to be anything up to €50 million. Does the Minister intend to review that in light of the changing circumstances and the fact that so many SMEs have performing loans which have gone, for example, through the global restructuring group, GRG, with Ulster Bank and have been sold on to vulture funds? If the €3 million limit was increased, it would mean that those SMEs could engage with the financial ombudsman, which they cannot do at the moment. When these loans are transferred to vulture funds, the loan is often then owned by, for example, Goldman Sachs or an organisation that is substantially bigger than the client with the loan. These clients simply cannot compete on legal fees while at the same time running a business and answering unreasonable questions. What are the Minister's views on the Act?

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