Mr. Paul Joyce:

It is a list of retail-credit and home-reversion firms. There is also a separate list of credit servicing firms. What this is doing is essentially giving regulatory status to these outfits to conduct their business. To our mind, it is facilitating the growth and continuation of a loan-servicing industry, under the guise of consumer protection. It is quite correct that the vast number of the current list of retail credit firms are transitional. Only a number of them are authorised. What is happening with the Central Bank in terms of those firms' transition is not really clear, but it is important to emphasise that a firm can continue its operations while it is transitional. A firm's operations are not suspended pending the grant of the authorisation. It continues to operate until it transits to full status.

It should also be said that the growth in the number of retail credit firms here has come about directly as a result of the latest legislation, that is, the Consumer Protection (Regulation of Retail Credit and Credit Servicing Firms) Act 2022. Part of that is, at long last, the decision by the State to finally regulate providers of hire purchase finance and personal contract plan, PCP, finance which are nonbanks. For a considerable period of time, there has been what we would refer to as sub-prime hire purchase, PCP lending going on and the providers were not regulated by anybody. Such finance and hire purchase agreements are now being regulated.

I saw the Deputy's reaction to the 23% APR limit. It is quite extraordinary that the 2022 Act regulates previously unregulated providers and sets out that the maximum APR that can be charged on a hire purchase agreement. Hire purchase also includes PCP. Apparently, the Attorney General's advice is that a PCP is a hire purchase agreement. The provider is allowed to charge up to 23% APR. Hire purchase PCP agreements run from three to four to five years. An APR of 10% on a three- or five-year agreement would be an extremely high cost of credit. Thus, it is beyond belief how this is being allowed to happen.

The Deputy mentioned a person who got in touch with her, who was told she had to be out of her house. This kind of thing happens when people are vulnerable and do not have access to advice. People will tend to believe or worry about what has been said to them. The truth of the matter is that the process to be granted a possession order in the courts is quite lengthy. The lender must issue a civil bill for possession in the Circuit Court office, which has to be served on the borrower or borrowers by registered post. It sets out a return date before the county registrar who is an officer of the court in the Circuit Court. There is a so-called practice direction that allows for an automatic adjournment to take place on the return date for another three to six months because, depending on the area, the courts are extremely busy. If people stand up for themselves and check out their options, a possession order will not be granted quickly.

Mr. Sreenan mentioned the court mentor scheme that MABS runs. What happens is that in most repossession cases, there are several adjournments and the county registrar is generally looking to see whether anything can be done to improve the amount of money the defendant borrower can offer. Many of these cases are in the courts for a long time. The Deputy will see some statistics in our opening statement about how long cases have been in the courts. They are on page 5. Some 2,203 cases have been in the repossession process for more than five years. That is a considerable number of hearings, back and forward and to and fro. I say this to reassure the Deputy that if people get advice and assistance, a possession order will not be granted quickly. The problem is that this process goes on and on. The attrition for people and dependent children, the opportunities that are missed and the frustration and illness that ultimately arise from this need to be carefully considered.