Cormac Devlin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I congratulate my constituency colleague on her elevation and welcome her to the House in this forum. I also welcome and support this Bill. Local credit unions are at the heart of our communities. They play a critical role in supporting the local economy and they are more important now more than ever. The Minister of State will be aware that in our own area in the constituency of Dún Laoghaire, Core Credit Union, and its branches in Monkstown and Blackrock, do superb work. They are very much engaged with the local community.

I support Government policy to expand credit union services and products, and to provide greater accessibility. The legislation will enable greater collaboration through the ability to establish corporate credit unions. It will enable wider availability of products across the movement through changes to the common bond. It will give credit union boards a greater focus on strategic issues through practical governance changes. A strong, resilient and collaborative credit union movement can take advantage of the opportunity afforded by banks withdrawing from Ireland and from branch closures. This legislation will help the credit union movement to grow as a key provider of community banking in the country. As we all know, it is an issue that has been debated for many years in this House. My party, Fianna Fáil, has been campaigning for such changes over the past number of years. To help credit unions seize this opportunity, it must be a priority to have this Bill passed by the Houses of Oireachtas as soon as possible so that the changes can take effect.

The Bill, which was passed by the Seanad in December, represents the culmination of two years of work led by the previous Minister of State with responsibility for financial services, credit unions and insurance, Deputy Fleming. During his tenure, he held more than 50 stakeholder engagements and met with more than 60 credit unions either individually or in groups, and many more at events. In total, in excess of 100 proposals, including all proposals submitted by sector representatives, for legislative and regulatory change were carefully considered. During a consultative round table in March of last year, the provisions of the Bill were supported by representative bodies at the meeting. The Minister of State, Deputy Fleming, and his staff deserve great credit for their work on preparing the Bill and I am sure we all express our appreciation for their efforts.

One aspect of the Bill relates to improving member services. Currently, credit union services can be somewhat of a lottery. If a member’s local credit union does not provide a current account or mortgage lending, he or she cannot join a credit union that does, nor can the credit union introduce the member to another credit union, though it can introduce a member to a bank or non-bank. While the common bond may appear to protect a credit union from competition from other credit unions, it does nothing to prevent competition from banks or non-banks. The purpose of the amendments relating to this objective is to increase the flexibility of the common bond and allow for practical improvements to help credit unions increase competitiveness and deliver a greater range of services to more members. These amendments are seen as a step towards ensuring accessibility to services for all members regardless of their common bonds and they are welcome. They will help people access the day-to-day services they need. I also welcome the other provisions of this Bill and I look forward to the legislation being implemented as soon as possible.

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