Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank Fianna Fáil and Deputy Michael McGrath for giving us an opportunity to talk about this important matter. Even though it has been discussed all along the way since I first came up here 17 months ago, many people are still in a great deal of trouble. One's home is one's castle, or it should be. There is nothing wrong with Fianna Fáil's proposal to set up an independent mortgage resolution office to give people someone independent to go to. I have no problem in the world saying to the Minister that people have been blackguarded and are still being harassed. Their phones are ringing early in the morning and late at night. That is wrong. I know it has happened. It is still happening.

Very recently, a woman who had paid €150,000 towards the mortgage on her house was still forced to leave it. They did it by giving her €20,000 to get out. She goes around the town in Kerry and the homeless services are trying to fix her up. She has two children who have been taken out of the school they are in. They have no hope of getting back into that school and being with their friends again in the near future.

I know another person who owed €500,000 on a mortgage on both his house and his business together. He has now found the money but the vulture fund to which the loan was sold will not agree to take the amount he owed. That is wrong. In another town, a woman and her four children are homeless because she and her husband broke up following the problems they had with their mortgage. These are sad stories but they are honest-to-God true stories.

The Minister said he was worried the banks might not lend to people applying for loans but he must think of the people who are in trouble first, because the banks have been looked after. The Government owned practically all of one bank but got rid of it as if it was a hot potato. This Bill is not a bad idea and if the Minister cannot agree all of it he should look at the good aspects of it. MABS was the only service that could help people in trouble but, sadly, the Taoiseach, Deputy Varadkar, recently proposed to reduce the number of MABS offices, which is deplorable.

There should be system for people who get into trouble in order that they can remain in their homes. The local authorities could buy the house and rent it back to them but we must not continue to put people out on the side of the road. Deputy Michael McGrath's Bill deserves more consideration.

See this speech in context