Feargal Quinn (Independent)
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I welcome Mr. Trethowan. He mentioned earlier that there can be problems with cash flow, rather than working finance. Is this not anticipated by the traders and the SMEs? Is there a lack of professionalism in that area? Are the reasons the banks give for their refusals logical? Do they seem understandable? The banks seemed to be far too lax in the past. On the basis of what Mr. Trethowan has said, it now seems that they are far too strict. Are the banks looking for guarantors? Since we changed our television set-up at home recently, we have been getting the British advertisements rather than the Irish ones. It is interesting that every second advertisement seems to be offering a loan. It is easy to get a loan from one of these companies as long as one has a guarantor. It strikes me as unusual to assume that someone who wants a loan will automatically have a guarantor to guarantee him or her. Mr. Trethowan said "we will encourage the bank to make the loan". What sort of encouragement does his office use? Is it a case of the carrot or the big stick? What does the office do? How does it manage to encourage a bank to give a loan?