Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I do not know how many times we can go back and forth on this question. We took the view that the proposal contained in the Bill is a balanced one, having regard to the need to assist people in debt and having regard to the real circumstances of creditors. We must ensure that we do not provide an incentive to individuals to run up large debts from which they believe they can then extricate themselves to the detriment of creditors who have acted in good faith by providing goods and services, or simply with money from the local credit union. I ask the Deputy to consider, for example, if the debt of €20,000 was owed to a credit union. We must be careful about this. Is the Deputy suggesting that we should allow people to borrow €50,000 from credit unions around the country and simply have that wiped out? Has the Deputy given any consideration to what impact that might have on the solvency of credit unions and their capacity to provide funding to others who wish to borrow and who in good faith intend to repay? At some stage one must make a judgment and our judgment was that €20,000 was an appropriate figure, bearing in mind the types of debt to which this could relate. It is relevant that in a neighbouring jurisdiction they have had the experience of a similar mechanism running for some time.

My Department and I considered that situation and how it was working. Based on that, we took the view that we should go a little higher than the British limit. I do not have to hand the exact figures in today's currency but my recollection is that £15,000 would have been just under €18,000. I do not know what the equivalent is if one uses today's exchange rate, as I have not looked. However, we took the view that bringing it up to €20,000 was reasonable but that taking it beyond that would create an incentive that would give rise to difficulties and could give rise to unintended consequences for credit unions throughout the country.

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