Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein)

I thank Fianna Fáil for introducing this motion but it must be said that it will be viewed by many householders with a healthy degree of cynicism, given that Fianna Fáil was in power for more than 13 years and is now attempting to protect home owners when it was wild west policies that got us into this position. I recognise that it is a fine mess we must try to solve but we must give credit in terms of the motion. It is well worded. It is a good motion and it puts it up to the Government to challenge the banking sector and not continue as if we are puppets of the banks.

The Government was elected on a platform which promised relief for those families struggling with their mortgages. That was a big issue for all of us during the election campaign and is an even bigger issue since the election. Since becoming a Deputy I have got an insight into the seriousness of the problem. As a councillor, people came to me with this problem but since I became a Deputy I have been swamped with people coming to me, and I am sure other Deputies on all sides of the House can identify with that.

Twelve months have passed since the election and this is one of the issues about which I am totally frustrated because very little has changed. We have had the Keane report and so on but nothing has changed for ordinary families struggling with mortgages. The taxpayers have recapitalised the banks, yet we continue to be strangled by the promissory notes, payment of which will come down the tracks in two weeks' time. That is causing a great deal of hardship yet we continue to bail out Anglo Irish Bank, under its new name, a bank that is no longer functioning. Meanwhile, the ordinary home owners continue to struggle with payments and under all of the other burdens they are carrying. There appears to be no bailout for those ordinary law abiding, hard-working families but the bankers and the bond holders are getting the bailouts.

I want to highlight the plight of those households in distress with local authority loans. I have raised this issue many times but I ask the Minister of State to take it on board. The statistics are available for all to see. The statistics for those in distress with local authority loans are staggering. Four out of ten of those loans are in serious distress of 90 days or more. That is a total of 9,000 families facing an uncertain future. That compares with one in 12 within the private sector loans. In Dublin city alone, the largest council in the country, one in three are more than 90 days in arrears. That is appalling. That was confirmed this week in response to a question at a local council meeting.

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