Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)

I am trying to tease out this point. The only time I came across mortgage interest supplement was when people had had an accident at work and were sick in the long term. They needed the short-term mortgage interest supplement to get over the hump. Now, it has become a long-term issue because of people losing jobs left, right and centre. They need mortgage interest supplement in order to keep going. My understanding is that the bank does not consider a customer to be in distress if the customer is paying the mortgage. The bank will not contemplate having a discussion about putting off two repayments in order to get over a hump. The banks will not engage unless the mortgage is three months in arrears. The original measure provided that the person had access to the mortgage interest supplement scheme for the first 12 months while the person is involved in the mortgage arrears resolution process and this has changed to a requirement on the person to be engaged with the bank or moneylender before the mortgage interest supplement is paid. A better way of putting that is that as soon as the person applies for the mortgage interest supplement, the banks must engage. As soon as the person has made the application, the person is in difficulty and interest must be paid. The Minister gave the banks the mortgage interest supplement and should oblige the banks to engage with the person or family. If I go to the bank tomorrow saying that I have a debt problem I am trying to get over, the bank will not engage with me if I am paying the mortgage every month. Most people are paying their mortgages until they are unemployed. Everything looks okay, even if they have some debt problems, until they find themselves unemployed. The person may be able to pay two or three months but then drifts into problems. Then, the person can look for mortgage interest supplement.

That is the way it should have been approached. That clarification should have been made. I presume anybody out sick for a short term will still be able to access the MIS as a natural process, although I know it is difficult to get it. The approach should have been that once a person applies for a mortgage interest supplement, on the basis of a job loss or whatever, the bank must engage with that person, because the person could still be paying the mortgage.

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