Mr. John Trethowan:

Each major economy in Europe now has a credit review function and the UK has a credit reviewer which deals with Northern Ireland. I work with him in Belfast in trying to bring some of the good practices from here to the North. Having seen what is being done here, they think they could do more in Northern Ireland. There has been a minimum amount of appeals in Northern Ireland, at 65 in two years. There is a reluctance to appeal by small and medium enterprises which apparently extends across Ireland. The UK reviewer does his job differently as he examines the banks' internal appeals rather than intervening directly with borrowers; we are much more hands-on with small and medium enterprises here.