Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I would agree with everything the Minister of State said if my point were in regard to the financial institutions doing a general trawl. That is not what I am talking about. Section 29(2) contains the phrase “uses information to which access has been given under this Act for a purpose other than one permitted by this Act”. There is nothing under section 16(b) that does not allow the financial institution to evaluate any risk arising from affording credit to the person who makes an application for €1,000. It is permitted to use the register to afford credit to me, which is fine because I will have applied for €1,000, but there is nothing to stop the institution using information to examine whether more credit should be afforded to me, although I might not have asked for it.

The protection is not against unsolicited calls to individuals stating they were pre-approved for loans, including credit card loans, as referred to by the Minister of State. I am arguing that when somebody made an application to his or her financial institution, not only was he or she granted the credit applied for but also encouraged to take more. While the Minister of State's advice is 100% correct, I am not sure about the consequences of not addressing the small grey area I describe. Please God, we will not return to the days described. However, if we allow it in the legislation, there is nothing the Central Bank can do by way of regulation. By including the words proposed, the Bill would not be weakened. It would just clarify that the purpose of the information is not to push more credit on people who have applied for it but to actually determine whether the applicant should be afforded it.

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