Mr. Matt Carthy:

I thank Deputy Burton for her questions. I do not have much to add in respect of consumer protection because, as Mr. Hayes has said, the EU is very weak in that area in terms of financial services. As we have seen the advances with the capital market union and all the rest, one of the things we have been calling for is an expansion of powers at EU level for the European supervisory authorities. We need an EU consumer protection agency specifically for financial services.

Having said that, every time we raise particular issues with the European Central Bank, ECB, in respect of Irish banks and their treatment of consumers - which as the Deputy knows sometimes verges on the atrocious, particularly in respect of the tracker mortgage scandal, in which we have seen even more developments in recent days - it continually redirects us to the Central Bank. I know this committee and others have been having detailed discussions on whether the Central Bank needs additional powers or whether it needs to use the powers it currently has. Last night I was reading the story of someone who has lost their home as a direct consequence of the tracker mortgage scandal. Something needs to happen. I will not direct this committee on what needs to happen.

The Deputy raised a really good point on small banking. It is one of the things I found most surprising in the European Parliament because there is a European representative body for many of those small community banks. It regularly comes to the European Parliament and meets us and gives its input in respect of legislative proposals coming from the Commission and how they would impact its members. It is a source of real disappointment that we do not have an equivalent sector here in Ireland because one can see the support it provides for small businesses and families. I know we have the credit union movement and post offices, which the Deputy mentioned, but these banks are on a different level in terms of being able to provide a certain level of investment. Of course we need to be mindful of some of the other provisions we put in place. I know of many very successful credit unions that are under huge pressures as a result of measures being put in place by the regulator that were intended for the larger financial institutions. That is not to say that we do not need regulation for credit unions because clearly we do.

I would absolutely welcome any initiative taken on this issue in these Houses. We might be able to facilitate something like that at an EU level and could assist with discussions on how we could promote and encourage the establishment of that type of banking sector. I am sure that other Irish MEPs would be very eager to engage with committees such as this if they were to come to us with a proposal for an initiative in the European Parliament to bring some of the actors in other states together in order to learn from their experiences and perhaps encourage people in Ireland to make a move on something like that.