Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

This is the same conversation about the exit of these two banks. I do not quite understand, from the Minister's response, how the decision was reached and what precisely he is trying to effect. I am one of the account holders affected by this and it is of extreme concern, as it is for 1 million other people too. It is a major hassle.

All the account holders and their business will stay here and be transferred over. My point is that all the business stays here. It is just that Ulster Bank and KBC will leave. I cannot figure out who is benefiting from that. As far as I understand, the levy is linked to the amount of business and the deposit interest retention tax, DIRT, obligations of the banks. Do the DIRT obligations change? If they are calculated as they were previously and applied to all the banks, then the DIRT obligation remains the same because there is the same amount of deposits and so on. All of that remains the same. The only difference is that KBC and Ulster Bank have moved out because it suits them. Either they are being rewarded for essentially doing the dirt on a 1 million customers for commercial reasons or the banks that remain, which will now have all of that business and accounts transferred to them, will escape the levy that they would have paid if those people were all their customers to begin with. The amount would remain at €150 million. I take the Minister's explanation that he had not projected it and this is an extension, but assuming the extension was applied to everybody as if all those account holders and business had been in just three banks before, we would be getting €150 million, but now we will get €63 million less. That is how I understand it.

We are looking for a report on all this, reviewing the implications of the banks' departure from the market and whether the levy should now be increased for Allied Irish Banks and Bank of Ireland as a result, including consideration of the deferred tax assets these banks hold. I would like to hear the Minister explain a little more convincingly why he has made the decision. It seems to me somebody is benefiting from an action that will cause a lot of hardship, difficulty, stress and anxiety for 1 million bank customers, who are the same people who helped bail out many of these banks, with the exception of Ulster Bank. They bailed the banking system out and are not getting much thanks for it.