Dan Neville (Limerick, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate. I wish to highlight the link between serious difficulties with mortgage arrears and debt and mental health problems. A phenomenon known has debt depression has been identified and is of growing concern. It calls for special mental health training for the staff of banks and debt collection agencies. Some of the banks are making efforts to work on this but progress is very slow in terms of bank staff understanding the difficulties, pressure, hopelessness and despair of many people who have mortgage difficulties. We all know how distressing it is for people to lose a home or to be in fear of losing it. It creates extreme stress, especially if such people also have the stress of having lost their job, which can create difficulties with self esteem. Such stress can give rise to problems within families because of changed circumstances. Families and relationships suffer and no matter how much parents try to protect their children, it can be impossible because the bad vibes, difficulties and stress are ever-present. This often leads to people in such situations taking solace in alcohol or drugs. Unfortunately, some go into even deeper depression and take their own lives. It was noted a year ago that 30 developers had taken their own lives because of the difficulties they experienced. One can be very flippant and can rightly criticise people but the level of serious mental distress and mental difficulty that people are experiencing because of debt cannot be underestimated.

It is important that staff of banks and debt collection agencies have a greater awareness and be trained to identify and deal with these situations and to respond appropriately. A person came to me who had very successful life in the recent past, with a very good job, a very nice house in a nice area and the only thing he wanted was a medical card. He could not pay his debts. His former lifestyle was gone. His wife was reduced to working a three-day week and he was claiming unemployment benefit. He had been a senior executive. We cannot judge people on the basis of their previous lifestyle. The depressive situation with regard to mortgages goes across all sections of society. We must recognise debt depression for what it is and be aware of how necessary it is for those who are dealing with people in crisis, whether because of mortgage or other debts, to be trained to understand, identify with and respond to what comes before them.

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