Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this important debate on an issue on which my colleague, Deputy Michael McGrath, has led the charge for the past two years. Sinn Féin has come on board most recently. The Irish Independenthas given the matter prominence during recent months and it is a significant issue, as the Minister acknowledged on "Morning Ireland" this morning. Hundreds of thousands of families across Ireland are being ripped off every day of the week.

I am surprised at the attitude the new Government is taking to the proposals before the House. Last night the Minister for Finance, Deputy Michael Noonan, displayed arrogance when he said a very meaningful suggestion, in legislation that would tackle the issue faceing hundreds of thousands of families, had been the cause of a 10% drop in bank share prices. It was ludicrous. The Government is stating our Bill is unconstitutional. It is coincidental that it is now unconstitutional, given that the Government did not cite unconstitutionality as a reason in voting it down in April 2015. At the time it did not have to mention the unconstitutionality of the Bill because it had such a large, sweeping majority that it was able to ram through any proposed legislation brought before the House. However, I am not surprised, given that during the past five years Fine Gael has been the champion of the banks to the detriment of ordinary working people, but I am surprised that the new coalition partners are not trying to make it see sense. I would have thought the Independent Deputies who support the Government would tell it to wake up and realise it was decimated in the most recent general election. Fine Gael and the Labour Party together lost more than 50 seats because they had failed ordinary, decent, hard-working people. If Fine Gael proceeds to push its amendment this evening, it will, once again, demonstrate that it is not interested in supporting ordinary, decent, hard-working people. It has allowed vulture funds to sweep in, take properties from people and sell them for much less than their loan values.

The mortgage to rent scheme was introduced to support families who ran the risk of losing their properties. In February I asked how many people had availed of the scheme. Of the 3,500 people who had applied for the scheme, 150 had been approved. This is despite the fact that the Government stated the scheme was under review and that it would make whatever modifications were necessary to support families at risk of losing their homes. It has not done it during the past five years and all indications suggest it is not prepared to take the necessary actions to support struggling families.

This debate is about variable interest rates. I will focus on the 300,000 variable interest rate customers whom the Government is letting down, despite its promise in the programme for Government to make every effort to take whatever action is necessary to support them. That is not happening. Every passing month it is crippling working families. I welcome the road to Damascus conversion of the Labour Party. Had it taken the same stance it is taking tonight back in February or March 2015, it would have saved hundreds of thousands customers thousands of euro.

In the spirit of our constructive proposals that would help families, I ask the Government to withdraw its amendment. The Independent Alliance focus in the Government should ensure it will withdraw its amendment and let the Bill proceed to Committee Stage. Although we are not saying it would answer all issues, it warrants further discussion. We did not pull this out of the hat in 24 hours but have worked on it for more than 24 months. It makes sense. I appeal to the Government to withdraw its amendment and let the Bill move to the next Stage.

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