Mr. Patrick Casey:

On lending restrictions, the Central Bank is obliged to act to restrict the business activities of weak credit unions if members' funds are potentially at risk. I understand from my regulatory colleagues that because of the scale of the issues and concerns identified within individual credit unions, some form of lending restriction has been imposed on approximately half of all credit unions. Such restrictions are subject to ongoing review by the regulatory side of the Central Bank.

Each individual credit union is entitled to request the Registry of Credit Unions to review its existing lending restrictions at its own request. There are broadly two types of lending restriction. There are monthly lending restrictions where, I understand, less than 10% of all credit unions have a restriction that limits the amount they can lend each month. This means that 90% of credit unions have no monthly lending restriction.