Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

He may wish to correct the record of the Dáil on that because the question he was asked was very directly about the annual industry funding levy. It seems pretty clear from reading the Official Report. As the Minister well knows, credit unions are under a lot of pressure because of the very low investment returns and loan to deposit ratios in the region of 27% which, I think the Minister will agree, is not sustainable in the long term. The representative bodies, including the league which is represented here today, have pointed out to us and, I am sure, to the Minister, that they really should not be treated like banks. They are not banks; they are not-for-profit organisations. They believe and I agree that the Minister has not placed sufficient value on the social capital, the work of their volunteers, their community base or their democratic structure.

It is evident from the Central Bank paper, "Funding the Cost of Financial Regulation", that it is its intention to move to 100% beyond 2022. The paper states that credit union recovery rates from 2022 onwards will be subject to review and a public consultation to guide strategy once 50% recovery rates have been achieved. The Central Bank is very clear that this is its intention. Why did the Minister not push back against the Central Bank and say this is completely the wrong time to impose these extra costs on credit unions? Other levies are winding down but the big one, the credit institutions resolution fund levy, is still at a very elevated level at about €7.5 million a year. Why did the Minister not make these points to the Central Bank and seek at least to defer or, ideally, to make an actual separation in structural terms between the treatment of credit unions and for-profit financial institutions?