Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It is different from local authority housing or some of the other issues in that the asset is the liability. It is a loan. There are approximately 150 of these properties in the transition areas, not a huge number. However, there is concern that the level of administration involved in their transfer from the county to the city would mean proportionately a significant amount of work for the city while it would actually be far easier to just let it rest with the county. There are numerous questions there. All the transactional data would have to come across. The county council would have to provide the city with complete paper files. There would have to be a risk profile. The county council may have initiated legal proceedings in respect of some of those borrowers, potentially. There would be changes to statutory reporting requirements to the central credit register. Then there is the issue of loan accounts that are in credit. While I think the general approach that is being taken makes some sense, although I would hope that the Department will consider resources for a lot of these issues, I think the housing loans are a particular category and I am not sure they can properly be categorised as an asset.