Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Mortgages can be repaid for up to 35 years. They are not the types of arrangements that allow people to walk into a bank with a pistol and decide they will no longer pay their mortgage.

The people who visit my office with genuine concerns about banking do not care how the issue is resolved. They want it to be sorted out soon which is no more than they deserve. The banks are the final residual issue arising from the carnage caused by the Fianna Fáil Party and their lackeys in the Green Party.

Mortgage to rent schemes are an excellent idea. They allow distressed mortgages to be transferred to a holding company such as the National Asset Management Agency or a local authority. The borrower is then able to continue to live in his or her home in a type of rental arrangement. While the concept underpinning the scheme is good, only a paltry number of people have availed of it. The structure of the scheme must be overhauled. The Government will introduce a suite of measures in the next couple of weeks and I hope this issue will be one of the areas it addresses.

Local authorities rather than the voluntary housing sector are the statutory housing authority. Most Deputies were local authority members at some point and will be aware of the work done by local authorities in the housing area. Local authorities have a role in the mortgage to rent scheme. Caps on values, occupancy rates in respect of bedrooms and the location of eligible homes need to be overhauled. More important, the veto built into the legislation and provided to unelected individuals in voluntary housing organisations who do not have a mandate and are not answerable to anyone must be removed. The ultimate responsibility for the scheme must be transferred to the men and women who are elected to local authorities. The Government has allocated substantial amounts of money to local authorities to address the problem of social housing. Mortgages for which no resolution will be found with the banks are also a social housing problem. It is important to note, however, that while some mortgages are beyond resolution, the majority of people are paying their mortgages and getting on with their lives.

I implore the Minister to restructure the mortgage to rent scheme and transfer responsibility for it to local authorities which are the competent housing agency at local level. The other agencies involved in this are should be removed from the equation because they do not add any great value.

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