Mr. David Hall:

As Mr. Byrne said, if Permanent TSB took back his mortgage in the morning, his problem would be solved. He does not want anything else. Ms Irwin is paying €60 more a month than she paid originally when she got into difficulty. Anybody on an interest rate of 7.25% would be in the same position. Is very important to highlight that nobody chose this. It is not like the subprime days when people could not get money and chose to go to subprime lenders or had to go to subprime lenders because of a bad set of financial circumstances. These were people who were with a mainstream bank that was owned by the State, and their loans were sold at a discount. I personally believe - and I have good experience in relation to bidding on and being a party to various loan sales - that they were sold, on average, at a 50% discount. It is galling to sit here and think that there is an interest rate of 7.25% on a loan that was bought by one of 30 unknown entities, potentially at a 50% discount. Of course, representatives of Pepper and others are perfectly welcome to come here and anywhere else and give those numbers, as is the Central Bank. The doors are open and I know the committee has opened the door for that. The word that Mr. Byrne used earlier was "fairness". That is all anybody is asking for.