Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 24 October 2019

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach

Tracker Mortgages Report: Central Bank of Ireland

Photo of Pearse DohertyPearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

We deal with people who make these complaints. They are deeply frustrated by the banks, but also by the Central Bank. I acknowledge the work that the Central Bank has done latterly in terms of pushing and pressuring the banks to own up to their responsibilities for what they have done, but the Central Bank supervises all of the work that they do. Every tracker mortgage is examined in detail by the banks to determine whether it has been affected and is in scope. In these cases, the banks have determined that the mortgages have not been affected or have not been affected to the degree that the customers believe. The Central Bank has supervised and signed off on that, meaning it again falls to the customer - we know that not all customers do this - to make the complaint and argument, to fight with the bank, to challenge its rationale and modalities and to win out finally, at which point the Central Bank says it is delighted with that. These customers are pointing out that the Central Bank is the agency that is supposed to protect them, particularly as the State has awarded it responsibility for guarding the public in terms of consumer protection.

Yet following scrutiny by the Central Bank of how the banks have examined a case, the consumer is left to challenge it and eventually win out.

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