Mr. Jeremy Masding:

I will make three points. I repeat what the Governor of the Central Bank of Ireland said, in terms of national risk management, that the transfer of credit risk and funding risk to investment funds constitute a national reduction in macro-financial risk. In the broadest sense, we are contributing to the diversification of that risk.

On individual customers, we, along with our colleagues across the banks, have raised underwriting standards. It is more focused on affordability as against a belief that asset prices only go one way.

On the product portfolios we have, customers can take a view on interest rates and should they choose to have a certainty of repayment, we offer fixed rate mortgages. On what we can do, we are using all the resources that we can.