John McGuinness (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I mentioned to Mr. Kelly privately the case brought before us involving Tony Lawlor, who explained his circumstances publicly to the committee. As I said earlier, I am completely dissatisfied at the manner in which this has not been resolved and anxious to be able to meet with the bank to discuss Mr. Lawlor's circumstances and to try and reach a conclusion. Because he gave his evidence here, I am putting it on the record of the committee that we had that discussion and that I have sought a meeting. I know there is a legal position, a court order and so on, but in cases like this, every avenue has to be exhausted by the bank from a humanity and compassion perspective relative to his circumstances and given that he wants to resolve it. The matter needs to be taken back out of the hands of solicitors and looked at again to see what can be done. The fact there is a court order means there are other avenues which are not open to him. He probably made a mistake earlier in being a lay litigant. He missed a few appropriate legal points and opportunities to present his case to the courts. I ask for another opportunity to come to a conclusion on that.

We will suspend for five minutes. I thank Mr. Kelly and his colleagues for coming. It was a good exchange. We will talk to them again in the future.