Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The issue of reforming the bankruptcy laws is fairly recent. The former Minister for Justice and Equality, Deputy Shatter, brought in legislation reducing the period from 12 to three years. At the time, the three-year period was not picked arbitrarily. Other options were considered, including the one-year option which is now the norm in Britain and Northern Ireland. Therefore, there has been recent consideration of what the appropriate term of bankruptcy should be in this jurisdiction. Data is now coming through which show how the changes are working out. The clearest change so far is that it has gone from 58 bankruptcies in the last year of the old legislation, to 448 now. There is quite a clear uptake by those availing of bankruptcy under the new terms of the Act.

Not all the implications have been assessed yet, but I welcome the debate. I know that a Private Members' Bill has been published, so we can continue the debate. I do not have a particularly fixed position on it. If another term works better, so be it, but I would like to have it evidence-based rather than change being made for the sake of it and on the basis of a lack of evidence.

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