Gerry Horkan (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Department and Central Bank for their opening statements. I am just reading on the RTÉ website that the Bill has already been passed by the Dáil. It passed Second Stage but we are now scrutinising it before Committee Stage. People following proceedings may conclude it has passed but it clearly has not passed. We are here to examine, test and try to progress the Bill, or otherwise. We have a series of briefing documents, including one from the Department of Finance running to 22 pages, a four-page opening statement from the Central Bank, and an European Central Bank opinion of nine pages. Many of the important points were covered by previous speakers.

The intention behind the Bill, from listening to Deputy Doherty and others, is to deal with the people who are in distress and unable to comply with the original terms of their mortgage and who find their loans being transferred to a vulture fund to enable banks to say they no longer have non-performing loans on their books. However, as Senator Kieran O'Donnell outlined, the view of many members of the committee, at least for as long as I have sat on it, is that vulture funds have a different agenda. They are not typically in for the long haul, unlike banks which have branches and a presence, are looking for new business and participate in communities to a greater or lesser extent. With vulture funds, it is a case of getting in, disposing of the assets and getting rid of the people in the houses being sold, whether tenants or owner occupiers, and, having extracted as much as possible, getting out of the country. In AIB's Project Beech, a vulture fund is paying 30 cent in the euro for the debt and I presume it will chase all of those loans. The State still owns three quarters of AIB. The hit for the write-downs on AIB's loans has been taken by citizens, the shareholder of the bank.

Viewed from the State's perspective - this probably applies more to the Department of Finance - when tenants or owner occupiers have to leave properties and subsequently present at a local authority seeking housing, the State incurs a cost. Has an impact analysis or examination of non-performing loans been carried out? It is fine to try to reduce the percentage of non-performing loans and there are many ways to do that, including restructuring and debt write-down. Nearly every bank has been before the committee and they all said they would not write down debts on an individual basis. They will not offer to sell people their loans for 30 cent, 50 cent or 70 cent in the euro, but they will offer these loans to vulture funds. Last week, the Governor of the Central Bank pointed out the value of having foreign investors because foreign money takes the risk and is coming into the country. I had not heard that point of view previously. Ultimately, people will be dispossessed and lose their homes. Maybe they made bad calls or took on too much debt. We acknowledge that but if they turn up at a local authority, the State has to rehouse them. Do the Departments of Finance and Housing, Planning and Local Government consider the possibility of the State acquiring some of the non-performing loans from the banks and dealing with them because ultimately we are passing on distressed loans?