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

I accept the fact that the information will be provided free of charge, arising from discussions on Committee Stage, and I very much welcome that. I also accept the Minister of State's argument regarding data protection, although I believe there are ways around it. It is not as if we are going to be plucking addresses from the sky, unlike the situation with the local property tax. These are addresses that will be given by the financial institutions which issue statements, which are also sensitive. That being said, the Government has gone further in terms of committing to a public awareness campaign. This credit register will simply not work and will have no effect on the public and how the public interacts with it unless there is an awareness that it exists.

I ask the Government to agree to two things before I withdraw my amendment. First, the Minister of State referred to an awareness campaign, but that can mean many things. We must accept the principle that we want to encourage as many people as possible to access this register. Second, the question of how people access the information is critical. There are ways to make access easier for people. I ask that the Government encourage the Central Bank to ensure that, for example, electronic access is made available. We should try to make getting this information as easy as possible for people. The more people who are aware of their credit status, the better we will be as a society in terms of accessing credit and knowing when access to credit will be available. This is a very good Bill and one that my party supports. However, unless consumers are made aware of this register, it will have very little effect on behaviour.

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