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

Governance, oversight and holding people to account is of massive importance to everybody, especially when it comes to the banking sector. Today, colleagues and I met with the Central Bank to discuss changes that it announced. Again, like everything, it seemed to have left many people behind. It still is insisting on 10% being made available from people’s savings if they are looking to purchase their first home and take out a mortgage for it. That is putting awful and undue pressure on those people. If they could prove the ability to pay a larger amount - in other words, 95%, if not the full amount - why not loan them the full amount? There would be absolutely nothing whatsoever wrong with that.

Coming back to what we are discussing here, as recently as 27 September, in what has become the largest fine to date issued by the Central Bank, Bank of Ireland was fined more than €100 million for what was noted a series of significant and long-running failings in respect of nearly 16,000 tracker mortgage customers’ accounts between August 2004 and June 2022. These failings by Bank of Ireland resulted in the loss of 50 properties, 25 of which were family homes. I will repeat that. Some 50 properties were lost, 25 of which were family homes. This could have been avoided if the Bank of Ireland complied with its most basic and fundamental obligations.

However, despite the massive and life-changing impact of this awful scandal by Bank of Ireland, not a single banker there was personally held accountable. In fact, those responsible continue to work at the bank and obtain bonuses and pay rises, while some of the impacted families are left with no homes. I, sadly, know people who were affected by this. They came to me at clinics throughout County Kerry. They were obviously traumatised by what was done to them. I do not want to say the bank responsible walked away scot-free, because of course it was fined, but there was not really an implication for it. However, where were the real people - the mothers, fathers, sons, daughters and grandchildren who were deprived of their homes and properties – left? They were left nowhere. What satisfaction did they get? None. One of the most valuable things that can be stolen from somebody is time. Everyone of us will run out of time before we run out of money. We have to think about that. Those people’s time and property was taken from them by a bank that would not adhere to proper governance. That is inexcusable. When you rob an individual of that, you are robbing them of something you cannot get back to them. Compensation or anything else will not put them back to where they were.

Remember, our banks owe us a lot. When I say “us”, I mean the people of Ireland. We bailed them out. I want to remind people when they are going to the bank with their cap in their hand, looking for a loan and assistance, that they are our banks. We own the banks. They would not exist in the first instance if it was not for us. If a young couple or a businessperson can prove that they have the ability to pay back a loan and if they have a track record, they should be able to get a loan. If they are working and can prove that they are workers and are looking for money, the bank should not be putting them down or make them beg, scrape or plead for their money. It is our bank in the first instance.

Going back to how banks started, the whole ethos behind them was the gathering and disbursing of money and the charge of interest to make people’s lives better and to let them get on with their lives. However, we seem to have a situation now in our main banks, including AIB, Bank of Ireland and the others, that they will make a small, little thing out of you. They will push you down and grind you down and leave you without money if they thought they could get away with it. It is fine for other people who can stand up for themselves. However, what about the young couples? They are the people starting out in life and the ones who I am worried about.

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