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

I will make two final points because the amendments are technical in nature and I hope we will be able to pass them quickly. I do not want my comments to be misinterpreted. What Deputy McGuinness just said about the tracker mortgage issue is correct; the money that was being returned to people was their money, full stop, end of story. The fact is that more than €500 million has been returned to people, but it was their money in the first place and whatever the consequences are for the return of that money on the balance sheet of banks pales into insignificance beside the fact that those people should not have lost their money in the first place. I am really clear on that.

I will conclude on this second point which I wish to emphasise. In some of our banks we have one of the highest levels of non-performing loans within the eurozone. That is despite the fact that we have an economy that has been growing very quickly in recent years. One bank in particular has a level of non-performing loans that is way higher than the European average, and even though, on average, we have made significant progress in reducing the level of non-performing loans in this country, it is still high in comparison with other countries despite the fact that we have a recovering jobs market, income is recovering and the economy, as we all know, in recent years has performed really well. That has consequences for our banks in terms of them being able to do all the other things Deputies have raised this evening. Ultimately, we do need to find a way that is socially acceptable in which that level of risk can be reduced because if the country ever finds itself in further difficulty, that level of risk will be a fault line. I will leave it at that.

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