Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputies Kelleher, Fitzmaurice and McGuinness for the additional points they raised. I will deal with some of them, as well as the matters that Deputy Michael McGrath raised.

Deputy Fitzmaurice raised a particular point on mortgage to rent and the participation of certain forms of homes within it. I was not aware of the issue he raised and I will follow up to see can I help with it. I would have thought that the location of the home should not be the issue in deciding whether a home can participate in mortgage to rent, so I am surprised by what the Deputy said. I will follow up on the matter.

There was an inference, among the different points that were put to me, that nothing is happening. When Deputy Kelleher was making this point, I accessed the Insolvency Service of Ireland's annual report to get some statistics about what is happening. The latter is the organisation that has been put in place to help our citizens who are coping with bad debt which is putting them and their families under huge strain, something that we, as a society, say is not acceptable. In the context of its most recent annual report, the Insolvency Service of Ireland dealt with bad and distressed debt of €2.18 billion. That was the scale of engagement they had. Interestingly, 87% of the personal insolvency agreements reached related to mortgages and 90% of our citizens who entered into personal insolvency arrangements remained in their homes. There is a route here for citizens who are facing exceptional stress and difficulty reaching resolutions that can allow them to keep their homes. The figures I have just read out provide an indication of what has been achieved. As stated earlier, if one looks at all of the different interventions that have been put in place, over 100,000 mortgages restructured, the amount of mortgage arrears in the country has decreased. The level of difficulty that certain forms of mortgages are facing has decreased as well. To date, a significant amount has been done to deal with this issue.

As Deputy McGuinness knows, because he has heard me say this before, I do not have the ability to intervene in individual commercial decisions that banks make. I know the frustration that can cause individuals who get caught up in this form of worry because I have dealt with constituents and citizens who are worried about the future. I have experienced the same kind of anxiety that Deputy McGuinness has, when people and citizens come to his clinic with concerns about their homes. No Government and no Minister for Finance, given all that we have gone through, can get themselves into a place where they intervene in individual decisions that banks make. We have, as successive Dáileanna, made the decision that the regulation of banks has to sit with the Central Bank, the regulator and organisations like the Insolvency Service of Ireland to deal with the kind of social issues that can emerge. Not only from a policy point of view is it something that should not happen but, from a legal point of view, because of the stakes that we, as a people, have in these banks - under the relationship agreement and the framework agreement that was made between the Government and the banks in which we have shares, and at the insistence of the European Commission - I am not allowed to be involved in individual commercial decisions that are made.

Deputy McGuinness made the point to me regarding what Mario Draghi said about the European Central Bank not forcing any individual bank to be involved in loan book sales. What the European Central Bank does is set the targets. It does not say much about how those targets are delivered. Of course, I then find myself in this House having to make the case and offer a degree of support for decisions that banks make to pursue objectives that are set by the European Central Bank. While President Draghi and the European Central Bank do not say how objectives are reached, they are pretty clear that these objectives need to be reached. The Deputy will have experienced at least a taste of this when the chief executives of the different banks have been before the Joint Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach, as they are regularly. The committee asks them why they have to meet particular objectives and they are clear, because this is what the regulator wants them to do. It wants these objectives delivered.

Deputy Kelleher made the point that our banks are now stabilised and do not have the kind of difficulty that we all hope never comes back again. If I can emphasise one additional message here this evening, it is that even if they are stabilised, the regulatory pressure they are under to achieve new goals is not lifting, I am afraid. As the reality of what banking union means across Europe becomes clearer to us, two things will happen. First, the level of support that will be available by Irish banks participating in the banking union will become clearer. Second, the requirements that are on our banks to meet the targets of being inside the banking union are also going to become clearer. While it is difficult, it is really in our interests, given all we have gone through, to have Irish banks participating in the heart of a banking union.

Deputy McGuinness is right that it is a social issue in relation to what can happen to citizens who find themselves in this difficulty. I am as aware of that as he is, but that is why we have organisations like the Insolvency Service of Ireland. That is why it is issuing vouchers to help citizens avail of services.

That is why it is running advertising campaigns to help people who are in difficulty. As I mentioned earlier this morning in the Dáil, many hours ago, more than 100,000 mortgages have been restructured and we have seen significant progress on the level of mortgage arrears in our country.

I will conclude on the point Deputy Kelleher raised in respect of the level of competition in our banking sector and the costs in our mortgage sector. I want to see more competition in the existing banks in our economy. I want to see greater encouragement for customers to switch accounts and to move from bank to bank. I want to see the total level of competition in the banking sector in Ireland increase. It will be a slow journey to get to that point but it is in the interests of everybody that the journey be completed.

The Deputy also made a point about the level of credit. He is right in his conclusion, but the factors affecting the level of credit and its pricing are more complicated than may have been suggested so far. It is only recently that we have seen the amount of credit being issued by Irish banks begin to exceed the amount of debt being paid off. That is only happening at this point in our economy and we need to see that change. While our banks are making more credit available, we need to see them being able to increase that credit in a sustainable way in order to meet the needs of Irish small and medium enterprises in particular.

Finally, there are many factors behind mortgage rates being so high in Ireland. I want to ensure the right social balance in supporting citizens who find themselves in difficulty but that, of itself, has consequences. The mortgage tracker scandal has consequences for the performance of banks. The low number of banks, to which the Deputy referred, is also a core factor with regard to the lack of competition. I want to see all of those things change.

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