Ms Derville Rowland:

There are a lot of concerns in the scenario the Deputy detailed. We play our role vigilantly and with a high degree of care in challenging an oversight on our part in the system with respect to borrowers who are, or could be, in distress. We engage very closely with the regulated entities on any information we get that is evidenced by substantiation. Only in circumstances where no sustainable alternative repayment arrangement is in place can looking at forfeiture of the underlying property even be considered. As we know, Ireland has been slow, in its system in general terms, to forfeit properties when mortgages are not paid. In any challenge or debated situation, where it is not through agreement, there has to be recourse to court or other options. That is outside the remit of the Central Bank of Ireland, but where the system presents us with information, we either deal with it ourselves because it is relevant to our work, or we are certainly not shy in passing it to those agencies which have to deal with that part of the system.

I can only assure the Deputy that we take our role very seriously. We pass on information that falls outside of our remit because we are one part of the system in Ireland that is designed to support people to stay in their homes. It is only after the code of conduct on mortgage arrears has been fully exhausted and people have been designated, for example, as being in long-term mortgage arrears, where no resolution is realisable or possible, that they end up in a forfeiture proceeding. In those cases, it may be that the Insolvency Service of Ireland or the court is part of that. We pass information to them because they have a role to play. I cannot tell from the detail the Deputy gave which exact part of the system applies. I have read some of this information in the press. Information is also given to us, as the regulator, in detail. We either deal with it ourselves or pass it on to those parts of the system to deal with it.