Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

A very good analysis was done by the Central Bank of the code of conduct for mortgage arrears and how it differs from banks to what are described in that report as unregulated loan owners. That is a very informative report and paints a more nuanced picture than what often comes across in the media as to how vulture funds deal with debts and with resolving them. We have also accepted legislation from the Opposition to extend regulation to vulture funds. We also have legislation going through at present, championed by the Minister of State, Deputy Moran, requiring the courts to take many more factors into account before issuing repossession orders. That is the work being done to extend consumer protections to people who are in arrears, to have a code of conduct for mortgage arrears, to extend regulation to the vulture funds and to require the courts to take even more into account before they issue repossession orders. That is quite a large body of work. We know that Ireland, relative to other countries, has a very low rate of repossession but we also need always to be aware of the bigger picture when it comes to these things. It is a difficult thing to say but we live in a country where hundreds of thousands of people are paying mortgages and paying interest at higher rates than those in other European countries. Some of this is down to inadequate competition in the banking sector. If increasing numbers of people do not pay back their loans and do not surrender the security, the effect will be higher interest rates for hundreds of thousands of people who are paying their mortgages. It will also make it much harder for tens of thousands of people who want to get their first mortgage to get credit. We must take into account the wider societal impact, to use the Chairman's term, of anything we do in this space.