Mr. Kenneth Jordan:

To pick up on the Deputy’s final point, I am unsure as to what the process would be but I would have no objection on that front. Our Department is mostly concerned with the Dormant Accounts Fund and the transfers, so perhaps our job is simpler on that point. Again I am not sure what the process would be but we will be more than happy to engage bilaterally. Time is an issue. I am the finance officer for the Dormant Accounts Fund, with a valuation function, so time is always an issue but I am definitely more than happy to engage.

I am not sure if the Deputy asked any specific questions. I meet the BPFI on dormant accounts quite regularly in any event and this matter did come up. It dawned on me as the Deputy was speaking that, by and large, we are not talking about safe deposit boxes at all here. These items are kept in what is called safe storage, that is, safes in banks where items have just been dropped in. The committee would need to speak to the BPFI about this to be reasonably clear about it but I am not sure if the banks necessarily know when an item has been looked at or last checked. The timeline issue probably needs consideration to determine if there is a timeline here, for example, whether we can say an item is 200 years or 150 years old?

I assume that people managing this process may want to do it in a sufficiently big batch to justify the process, if that makes sense. I wonder with regard to the timelines if this might be done along the lines of tranches and years. There is definitely an issue with the banks in that I am not sure if they have a full knowledge of the timelines for when items were deposited. Again, that is an issue for the detailed drafting.

The Deputy made a point about the register. To my mind, the simpler the register is, the better. The information involved is very limited.

The reason the step taken with regard to the Dormant Accounts Fund is so accepted - Deputy Ó Cuív is very aware of this having been involved in this area for much longer than I have - is that the system works very well. People know they get their money back. We see recoupments of perhaps 40% of what goes in a given year. It eventually finds its way back out again because people appear. I know the timelines are much shorter but I am sure that if something of value is found, people will appear. It is still a very important step to provide that people have a right to the property in perpetuity. What has made the Dormant Accounts Fund work is that people can always come back and get the money. The rest of the funds then go towards good purposes.