Mr. Padraic Kissane:

I am on record already with regard to my views on Permanent TSB. There were two panels there - the independent review panel and the customer appeals panel. Of the submissions that I made on behalf of customers to the latter panel, the only description I can use is that those customers were "treated disgracefully". I make no bones about saying that. Thankfully, however, the bank itself has now realised that. Members must understand that submitting an appeal in the first place is very difficult for people. They are talking about matters that are very personal to them. There did not seem to be any credence given by the bank to the fact that I had met these people, listened to them and assessed their case. Essentially, I listened to them and determined whether an appeal was merited. Members of the aforementioned panel - and the chairperson, in particular - then called into question their position. Members must remember that customers were automatically awarded 10% of the interest that was overcharged. If someone was overcharged €50,000 then he or she was awarded €5,000, for example. People who were rich and who did not care whether the interest rate was 10% or 0% got the 10% payment. That is fine because there should have been an acknowledgement for the wrongdoing. However, what seems to have morphed into the appeals process was that if customers got 10%, they had to prove their claim to be above that in order to get any money. If that was to follow, then there was no acknowledgement of any wrongdoing. The people who suffered the most were those who were financially restricted. They were also the people who submitted appeals because the cause and effect was more dramatic for them.

While I am not here to defend Permanent TSB, it was the first out of the block on this. It was adapting to a process that was new to all the banks and was the first to do so. It did not look right that a member of Permanent TSB staff would be on the panel. Thankfully, that has now been addressed by all the banks. As Deputy Michael McGrath said here, it was like having a member of the defence team on the jury. The statistics are clear on this. I saw their last presentation here. They are still reluctant to deal with the independent review panel statistics and the customer appeals panel statistics separately. That is because the customer appeals panel statistics are astonishingly in favour of the bank. That is ironic, given who is causing the effects.

If somebody was awarded €2,000 in compensation and decided to appeal, he or she would have to prove that the damage done to them was in excess of €2,000. Mr. Kissane can correct me at any time. Such a person would actually have to show that he or she lost the value of €2,000. Is that correct? For example, perhaps he or she incurred expense in travelling to Dublin to meet with legal advisers or taking other steps. If he or she could not show that the damage exceeded €2,000, the appeal was not successful. That meant that the wrongdoing, which should be an automatic sum because the banks took money from their customers wrongly, never occurred. A customer was left out-of-pocket.