Mr. Colm Kincaid:

The first thing to say is regarding any borrowers who are in a situation where they feel they may be challenged in making their mortgage repayments. I remind them that their provider - whether it is a non-bank or a bank - has regulatory responsibilities to them to engage with the lender and for that lender to support them. I would also say that we have more than 400 licensed mortgage intermediaries in the State. They could also seek advice about what options might be available in the market. Any information we receive - and we do receive information from individual borrowers, political representatives and others - we review, we consider and we will intervene with the entities that we regulate if we are concerned that we are seeing a systemic breach of the rules that we have set down, or that it is not meeting our expectations. To be clear, however, this is not to say that the onus is on borrowers. It is to say that regulated lenders, including the firms we are dealing with, have very clear obligations to have supports, resources and options available for any borrower who feels they may be challenged in meeting their mortgage.