Mr. Sean Farrell:

Without repeating all of Dr. Finnegan's points, there is a fundamental difference between the way that we and some of those other jurisdictions assess lending. It concerns the absolute focus on repayment ability of capital and interest over an agreed period. While we are all in a position to provide interest-only repayment schedules as appropriate through the cycle, we do not lend on the strength of the assessment, but on the strength of our ability to repay. Having visited New Zealand and examined its banks' models relative to its farming systems, mimicking them in Ireland would not be appropriate. We plan to continue modelling our repayment schedules on longer-term repayments of capital and interest.