Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Ar dtús báire, cuirim mo bhuíochas in iúl d'achan duine a labhair ar an ábhar seo anocht. Mar atá ráite ag go leor Teachtaí eile, is ábhar fíorthábhachtach é a chuireann isteach go mór ar chuid mhór dár saoránaigh. Gabhaim mo bhuíochas leis an Aire, an Teachta Noonan, na Teachtaí McGrath, Boyd Barrett, Barry, Pringle, Harte, Ryan, Healy-Rae, Ó Caoláin agus Nolan agus an tAire Stáit, an Teachta Kyne. In achan rud a luadh inniu sa díospóireacht, bhí sé iontach soiléir go bhfuil cáineadh láidir á dhéanamh ag Teachtaí Dála d'achan pháirtí agus ag Teachtaí Neamhspleácha ar an dóigh a láimhseáil na bainc an 15,000 duine atá thíos leis an méid a thit amach sna bainc le cúpla blian anuas. Tá difir ann maidir leis an dóigh chun dul chun tosaigh. Tá dhá leasú curtha síos: ceann an Rialtais agus ceann an Theachta McGrath. Mar a dúirt an Teachta McGrath, ba chóir don Dáil seo labhairt le glór amháin agus muid ag vótáil ar an rún seo ar an Déardaoin. D'iarr mé é seo ar an mbeirt Theachta agus dúirt an Teachta Noonan go raibh sé ag tabhairt tacú don spiorad agus croílár an rúin a chur mé féin síos ar son Shinn Féin agus an rud céanna maidir le leasú an Theachta McGrath. Sílim gur chóir dúinn díriú air sin; ní chóir scoilt a bheith ann. An fáth gur chuir mé síos an rún seo ar son Shinn Féin ná chun a rá go soiléir leosan atá thíos leis seo go bhfuilimid ar a dtaobh agus chun ráiteas soiléir a thabhairt do na bainc go bhfuilimid dáiríre nuair atáimid ag caint ar fheabhsú a dhéanamh ar an reachtaíocht atá againn chun a chinntiú nach dtarlóidh é seo amach anseo agus go rachaimid go dtí an pointe inar féidir le hachan duine a rá céard é an ráta ceart agus an méid airgid a bhaineadh díobh a thabhairt ar ais.

I welcome the contributions that have been made. There was a lot of common ground in all of them. Members have used the words that I have used myself on many occasions in saying that this situation is scandalous and outrageous. This is also some of the language we are hearing from the Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan. There is no doubt that when we boil this down, many of us - and I include myself - have been inundated by individuals who have contacted me with regard to how this has personally affected them. I am sure there is not a Member in the House who has not had a constituent telling their Deputy what this has meant to them. I remember my first personal experience in uncovering this. I was dealing with individuals in their sitting room. They were worried they were about to lose the family home. They had just, for the first time ever, gone into arrears of €300. I explained to them that there was no way they were going to lose their family home over just €300 of arrears. I asked them to pull out the contract and within minutes it was very clear to me, it was in black and white, that after the period of fixed interest rate had expired they would go back on to the tracker rate. I asked them what tracker rate they were on and they explained they were on a standard variable rate. I told them it was in black and white that they were entitled to a tracker rate after the variable rate period. They took a case to the Ombudsman but at that time there were other cases with the Ombudsman and a lengthy delay. This was because the banks, in particular the Permanent TSB, a State owned bank, fought these individuals all the way. When the Ombudsman came down on customers' side the State owned bank said "No" and that the bank was going to take the Financial Services Ombudsman - the customers' representative - to the High Court.

Years went by, people were overcharged and had to make sacrifices and some of it was very personal. It affected people very much. I recall a conversation with one individual who had just come off the phone with her bank. The mother was left in tears. The child, who had not reached its sixth birthday, came up with a piggy bank and gave it to the mother saying "That is for the bank". The mother felt terrible because she felt that she had failed to insulate her child, who should not be thinking about these things, from this issue that had taken over the child's family for the last number of years. She should not have been made to feel like a failure but the phone calls were to plead with the banks to restore the family back onto the rate they were entitled to. There were different sacrifices, things that can never be compensated for, such as missing out on family activities, taking the children on holidays or, if the child is in transition year, the school trips where these families might be the only ones whose children could not go. There are many families who cannot do that anyway, but these particular families could have done so only for the fact that the bank was overcharging them in the region of €500 or up to €1,000 per month.

There were also cases of families that were broken up. It was not that the marriage broke up, but because the bank was overcharging them one of the adult family members had to leave the State and find a job elsewhere. That will never be compensated for. How does one compensate for children growing up for those years without their father there every day? It can never be compensated for but that is what the banks have done in this regard.

The more I got into the situation the more astonished I became that this seemed to just brush past. There was no outrage in regard to how this happened. I make the point again that if the banks had got away with this it would have been €1 billion they had taken wrongfully from 15,000 individuals. It is the biggest swindle the State has ever seen.

The Minister spoke about the Central Bank. The Sinn Féin motion states that the Central Bank's industry-wide review in late 2015 was belated. Let us be clear. The review was a result of a letter that was sent by the CEO of the Irish Mortgage Holders Organisation on 26 October 2015, just one month previously, that called on the Central Bank to have an industry-wide review. At that point the Permanent TSB acknowledged that it had overcharged some 1,400 customers. The Irish Mortgage Holders Organisation was telling the Central Bank that the organisation had hundreds of other individuals on its books whom it believed were in the same situation. The finance committee wrote to the Central Bank backing the call from the Irish Mortgage Holders Organisation and that prompted the bank into action. I believe there are serious questions there.

The spirit of the Fine Gael motion is similar in terms of getting to the crux of what happened but there are a number of crucial parts missed. I will focus on the Fianna Fáil motion because it is nearly identical to what we are saying, bar two issues. One issue is that it deletes the fact that the Central Bank only acted after the situation had been well known for a number of years. That is a statement of fact and it is a minor issue with regard to the motion. The second issue relates to the reference to the different agencies working together to identify if - not that they are, I have my own views - individuals as well as entities should be held accountable.

The other difference is the Fianna Fáil motion's call for an independent organisation to review the legislation. There is already an independent organisation doing this work. The Law Reform Commission issued a paper earlier this year on white collar crime. The Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement ODCE, the Garda and the Central Bank should work together because it is in no way just the responsibility of the Central Bank to investigate this. There are enough grounds already for the two other organisations to carry out their own investigations. I refer to a 2010 submission by the ODCE on white collar crime which is shouting out to us. Let us not forget that we are talking about 1,500 individuals who have had hundreds of millions of euro taken from them. Individuals have lost their houses. In some cases mental health has broken down and there have been other consequences.

Our motion says that we need to strengthen white collar crime legislation. The Fianna Fáil motion is proposing an investigation and then acting on the recommendations. The Sinn Féin motion makes reference to the fact that in 2013, the Central Bank head of financial regulation said that Ireland needs to strengthen white collar crime legislation. He was telling us that the best way to stop this happening in the future was to provide for individual as opposed to institutional accountability.

The submission to which I referred by the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement states:

The ODCE has only a partial role with respect to "while collar crime", and therefore our experience is not as extensive as that of An Garda Síochána. Nevertheless, we consider that the following issues may be worthy of short-term or longer-term policy consideration:

- extending criminal liability in the areas of reckless trading...;

- creating new offences in respect of bank fraud, mail fraud, wire fraud and the making of false statements in loan and credit applications;

- raising the penalties for potentially serious "white collar crime" offences;

- extending the periods for investigating/prosecuting particular "white collar crimes" where these periods are unrealistically short;

- clarifying the precise form of a corporation's criminal liability and the duties of its officers to prevent malpractice;

- clarifying the extent to which accused can defend themselves on the basis of erroneous legal advice;

- improving the ability of An Garda Síochána and regulatory bodies to work together to fight "white collar crime";

- introducing a more widespread use of administrative sanctions as an option as well as criminal sanction and, in some cases, decriminalising minor regulatory obligations which are subject to administrative sanction;

- improving the investigation and prosecution of "white collar crime" by the use (or greater use), in appropriate cases, of immunity programmes, plea bargaining, deferred prosecution agreements, certificate evidence and hearsay evidence in criminal investigations; and

- alleviating, where appropriate, the inhibiting impact of legal professional privilege and the exclusionary rule of evidence in "white collar crime" investigations and prosecutions and providing to some extent that witnesses who are not suspects can be compelled to give evidence in such cases.

That is what this particular agency was telling us seven years go. In 2013, the former Financial Regulator told us it is difficult in the extreme to hold individuals to account as a result of what is contained in the Statute Book.

We must get to the bottom of this scandal. We must find out what happened and ensure the affected individuals have their repayments restored to their proper rate, which is not happening under the current scheme. We need to ensure the appeals process, which is not working in the interests of these customers, is put back in place. We must ensure the Central Bank starts to give this matter the focus, attention and urgency it needs. In addition, we need to ensure this never happens again in another guise. To do that we must take heed of what we were told by the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement and the former Financial Regulator. We need to do what everybody in this country knows we must do. After eight years of financial crisis, we bloody well know the system for detecting and penalising white collar crime is not robust enough to hold certain persons within corporate entities - viewed by many as criminals - to account.

I commend the motion to the House. In recognition of the points raised by the Minister and Deputy Michael McGrath, I ask that the Government withdraw its amendment and allow the Dáil to adopt a single voice on this matter. There is little difference in substance between the amendment and the Sinn Féin motion.

See this speech in context