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

I put to the Minister of State the enormity of what has happened to families with these mortgages rate increases. Ordinary mortgages have gone up by €400, €500, €600 and €700 per month. People have to try to come up with that extra money. They are finding it impossible. That has been well spoken about here already.

There is one thing I want to say about our banks. We must get back to the type of banking we had long ago when a person could go into an AIB or a Bank of Ireland, or any one of the other banks, and could meet a person called "the manager". This was the real person, the man or the woman who was in charge. I want to remember people like Denis Cronin and Frank McGonigle, and David Brooks, and all these great people in Kerry over the years who were the managers of our banks. They were real people standing behind the counter waiting to meet their customers, to take them into a room to discuss their issues, their difficulties and their requirements. They were kind and they were tough but they were understanding. They knew what they could do and what they could not do. There is now this thing of, "Well look, we'll take it from you and send it to Dublin and we'll see how it will get on." God protect me, I am only one small little person but the amount of times I have heard this story, "We will send it to Dublin." I say God help us because we will never again see it coming back from Dublin. If we will be waiting for a positive response, waiting we will be. Give those people autonomy of their own business and make them real managers again, people who can decide "Yes, we are going to help you" and "Yes, we understand your difficulty". They will build up proper relationships. Instead we have people called managers who are not really managers because they are toothless. They do not have power because it is all centred around Dublin.

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