Mr. Gabriel Makhlouf:

It is up to the State to decide what it wants to do. It is important that banks, in particular in Ireland, reduce their exposure to non-performing loans to make them more resilient because that is in the interests of the community as a whole. As far as consumers are concerned, and this point came up earlier, it is immaterial who the lender is because the consumer's rights are the same irrespective of whether the lender is a bank or a non-bank.