Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The major concern when banks are selling to the vulture funds is that there is no long-term interest. Pepper is an agent. It is clear from the prospectus that this can be sold at any time. Indeed, Pepper can be removed as the agent at any time by this vehicle. We have no idea who owns the vehicle. The big concern here relates to certainty. Regardless of people's opinions of high-street banks, they know that they want to be here in 30, 40 or 50 years. Permanent TSB structured its split mortgages in a way that meant up to 80% of each mortgage was warehoused. Pepper is saying that unless things change, it will continue to honour those split mortgages all the way through. What does the word "change" mean in this context? Does it mean that if somebody's wages increase by 2% or 3% in accordance with inflation - this is subject to legal test - Pepper will be allowed to have a review? The reality is that nobody has trust in Pepper. People definitely do not have trust in the vehicle that owns their loans now. That vehicle did not exist 30 days ago. This point relates to Bank of New York Mellon and Wilmington. This is a shelf company. It shares its registered address with another 126 businesses in a building down the road. There is no face to this. Pepper has come in here after a long challenge for us to try to get it to come in. The people who own these loans are faceless. We have no idea.

I want to ask about the review. What does the guarantee mean in terms of change? Obviously, people's circumstances will change. We hope they will change for the better. Nobody is going to stay in exactly the same position. What guarantee is being given to people? When Mr. Ryan states that there is a legal guarantee, can he specify where that actually exists? Can he outline where in the prospectus the issue of the operating committee to which he has spoken, as he said in response to Deputy Michael McGrath, is dealt with? Perhaps he can dig out a page reference.