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

I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Paschal Donohoe, and Deputies Timmy Dooley, Stephen S. Donnelly, Seán Crowe, Peter Mathews and Mary Lou McDonald for their contributions.

When I heard that the Government intended to reject the legislation, I was disappointed, as I could have brought forward a much more robust Bill. I could have revisited the personal insolvency legislation and sought to remove the veto of the banks. However, I did not do so because I knew the Government would oppose me. As a result, the legislation before the House would not prevent family homes from being repossessed. That is despite the fact that many Members believe family homes should not be repossessed at this point. We did not bring forward a Bill of the kind to which I refer because we knew the Government would object to it. We decided instead to introduce the Bill before the House which seeks to put in place stronger protections for homeowners and rebalance the scales in favour of homeowners and against the banks. Other contributors have acknowledged the fact that the gladiators on the front line who are taking on the banks on behalf of distressed mortgage holders - the Irish Mortgage Holders Organisation, New Beginning and others - recognise that this needs to be done because the scales have been completely tipped in favour of the banks.

I am not sure whether the Minister of State is aware that repossession does not happen on a voluntary basis. It happens against the homeowner's will. People are having their houses repossessed without being given access to any form of legal representation. They are obliged to go to court and do not know what is going on because they have no legal representation. As stated, there are massive delays in providing free legal aid. Those on the front line have informed us that people are going before the courts without any legal representation whatsoever. It is for this reason that we believe judges must adjourn cases involving people at risk of losing their family homes to their banks, as a result of repossession, and who have not gone through the personal insolvency process. Judges should adjourn such cases and instruct those involved to partake of the process to which I refer. As stated, a bank should not be able to repossess someone's home without all of the other available options being exhausted first.

The Minister of State has indicated that what we are seeking to do would limit the options open to the courts. Perhaps we should limit these options. We are talking about individuals who may be scared out of their wits because they are being brought before the courts - perhaps for the first time in their lives - by the various banks, vulture funds, etc., and their legal teams in order to have their homes repossessed. Perhaps we should legislate to oblige judges to adjourn proceedings in such cases and encourage those involved to consult a personal insolvency practitioner, PIP. The Minister of State did not deal with the second part of the legislation. The 2012 Act makes provision whereby a judge may do as I am suggesting. However, I presume this might be at the request of the individual involved and that he or she might not be in a position to make such a request as a result of a lack of legal representation.

The other point to make in this regard is that the banks would be obliged to cover the costs involved. As a result and in circumstances where someone's family home was being repossessed and the judge adjourned the proceedings and directed him or her to consult a PIP, the bank should cover the fee. That would be fair and practical. If, after all, a judge rules that the person should lose his or her home, he or she will be put out onto the street. The Minister of State did not comment on that aspect, but he did state the possibility of the options open to the courts being limited was one of the main reasons the Government was opposed to the legislation.

The Bill recognises that in the case of repossession of rental properties, tenancy agreements must be upheld. This is something about we have been asking the Government to take action for a number of years and the Minister of State indicated that it might be dealt with in the Seanad in the context of another item of legislation. Regardless of this, what really scares the life out of me is that the Government has not outlined any step it proposes to take in order to deal with the issue under discussion. I reiterate what I said earlier, namely, that 30,034 letters seeking voluntary surrender or legal repossession of people's homes have been issued. That means that there are 30,034 reasons the Minister of State should be indicating that while it has some issues with the Bill, the Government supports it. If it has misgivings, they could be dealt with on Committee Stage.

I do not mind if the Bill is strengthened and improved or if things must be deleted. We will deal with that issue. There are people, however, who face the repossession of their family homes and are scared out of their minds. It is not only their financial but their mental health that is at risk. I have met them. We must stand up and take notice of this. When the banks were last before the Joint Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, we were told that 15,000 letters seeking repossession or voluntary surrender had been sent. This figure has increased to 30,000 after only six months. The reason for the increase is the Land and Conveyancing Law Reform Act 2013, which has allowed banks to proceed in this way. I welcomed the Government's setting of targets, but what has happened is that banks have been allowed to issue these letters as a way of reaching them. It is not just me saying that. Ulster Bank told the committee that if the easiest way to reach the target was to issue legal letters, that was what it would do.

The Minister of State has told us, as we have heard before, that the Minister for Justice and Equality, Deputy Alan Shatter, will keep the Personal Insolvency Act under review. The Minister is completely distracted by his personal scandals involving GSOC and the bugging system and has his eye completely off the ball. If we had a Minister reviewing the matter who was on top of his game, we would not have this. It did not take the committee to bring this out. The Minister should have known about it, given that two of the major four lenders intend to veto every single proposal coming from a PIP that involves secured creditor write-down, yet we still hear that the matter will be kept under review. Alarm bells should be ringing loudly in the Departments of Justice and Equality and Finance. Maybe the Government's eye is not completely off the ball. Maybe it is willing to be a spectator in this game where the banks are let off the leash, mortgage holders are put at their mercy and a couple of individuals who have come together in different organisations are there in the middle of the mess trying to represent tens of thousands of people.

The Minister of State said the targets were a great success. I do not deny his figures on concluded solutions. Bank of Ireland said yesterday that of its concluded solutions, 1,000 involved repossession or voluntary surrender. The Minister of State did not mention that. He did not mention that in a large number of cases the parties to these concluded solutions are people who are forced to give up their family homes. He did not mention anywhere in his contribution the fact that 30,000 letters have been issued seeking legal repossession or voluntary surrender, a large number of which relate to family homes. The targets are not working. No bank would have met the targets if it had not been for letters seeking repossession. Bank of Ireland, AIB, Ulster Bank and permanent tsb would have failed miserably if it were not for that. The Minister keeps telling us that banks should not be using these letters to achieve repossession, but he hides behind the Central Bank. It is time to stand up for ordinary people and Irish interests.

The Government heralds the personal insolvency legislation as the other revised measure. The Minister of State said he disputed my claim that it had no effect, which was not true. I did not say it had no effect. Sinn Féin voted for the personal insolvency legislation. It is important to reduce the bankruptcy term to three years and implement a system to deal with multiple creditors. However, we have major issues with the legislation, one of which is the fact that banks retain a veto. A second issue is that there is no public personal insolvency, with the result that many people cannot avail of the provisions of the Act because of the fees. Yet the Minister of State heralds the service as the bee's knees. The Minister, Deputy Alan Shatter, told us last year that he expected 19,000 cases to come before the personal insolvency service in its first 12 months of operation. In the first seven months, there have been 523 cases. The Minister of State heralds this as a way in which the Government is dealing with the mortgage crisis. The insolvency service has resolved four mortgages. I emphasise the number - four. We must pull our heads out of the sand and start to talk about reality.

The Minister of State referred again and again to the stress, strain and misery that people are experiencing. I know he is genuine when he says that. However, he cannot be genuine in those comments and then say "We are going to do nothing about it." The system is broken. The banks have abused the targets and are seeking repossession knowing the Government has adopted a hands-off approach. The personal insolvency system is broken. Richie Boucher, one of the most arrogant CEOs of any bank to have come before the joint committee, is telling us he will veto every single proposal. Ulster Bank says the same. I am sure the vulture funds will follow suit. It is broken and we need to fix it. The House has a responsibility to act in the interests of the people.

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