Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

On the Minister of State's last point, I merely used that example as a reference to indicate the levels that exist countrywide. It is indicative of the position in a county similar to it, be it Tipperary or Laois, and of the position across the country for similar types of counties. I used that example merely to show that in a county such as that, there is €1.7 million of a loan value that is greatly distressed and requires the attention of the new publication that the Minister of State mentioned. If he cannot give me a timescale for it, can the Government not honour its commitment to bring this forward before the summer recess?

Has the Money Advice and Budgeting Service been consulted and formed part of the consultancy process to bring about this publication? The Deputies present were here last week when we discussed a Private Members' motion on the area of credit management and Deputies across the board complimented the work that MABS is doing. They are at the coalface in dealing with this issue and they must form the basis of any publication which sets out an agenda and a ways and means by which local authorities will deal with this issue in the future. What are the Department's plans for the shared ownership scheme in the future?

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