Let me refer to the document presented to us last night by the Minister. It states lenders are required to set up an arrears support unit to assess arrears and pre-arrears cases. The support unit will involve the same individuals in the banks who are putting people out on the streets after having taken their houses from them. Does the Government not realise this? The document also states that if a borrower agrees an alternative payment arrangement for his or her mortgage with his or her lender and continues to meet the revised payments, the lender cannot start legal action against him or her or seek repossession. That is not forcing the banks to do anything because the ones who will be calling mortgage-holders to make the new arrangements are the same people with whom the mortgage-holders have dealt heretofore. The banks have been doing this for the past five years and are making no agreements; they are just forcing people out of their houses.

See this item in context