Mr. Paul Joyce:

It is good to hear that the approach has been adapted. The problem is the question of collection charges. There is still a lot of collective credit and clearly the rate that should apply to that would be higher, on the basis that the cost of collection is greater. That would be one issue. The move towards electronic collection of loans will be a significant development. I understand Provident and others facilitated electronic transactions during the course of the pandemic so the costs of collection were not incurred. The other question that occurs to me immediately is on the length of the loan. If a moneylender offers a six-month loan and a 12-month loan I would think the cap on those two loans should be different, on the basis of the length of the loan. Maybe that is a factor that needs to be looked at as well. A lot depends on what data the Central Bank comes back to the Deputy with. He mentioned three times the market rate but is that for the same length of loan? Collection charges are also an issue.

As another observation, in an ideal world people would join their local credit union, save with it and borrow money from it. However, as has been said already, a significant number of people use moneylenders uniquely or as part of a suite of lending options. The risk of migration is not particularly great but it would remain to be seen if the rates that were struck led to a number of licensed moneylenders leaving the market. That may or may not be the case and I do not know whether their opinion has been canvassed about this. There may be a risk of migration.

Everybody supports the approach the Deputy is taking and I completely agree that, given that this Private Members' Bill has been in pre-legislative scrutiny for quite some time and a lot of work has been done on it, it would be a pity if it was now overtaken by a Government Bill, which would have to be initiated and on which there would be further debate and so on. This is an urgent issue and it has been so for many years. Perhaps a co-operative approach between the different parties is required. The Deputy has helped by seeking information from the Central Bank on rates to help him arrive at a cap or series of caps that would do the least damage and the most possible good.