Results 3,481-3,500 of 7,975 for speaker:Joe Higgins

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with Bank of Ireland (4 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: How many currently?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with Bank of Ireland (4 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: I am anxious to get a figure because it relates to what Mr. Boucher calls debt forgiveness, but I do not. In response to my colleague Mr. Boucher said categorically the Bank of Ireland did not do what he called debt forgiveness. Does that mean that Bank of Ireland has not, in respect of any owner-occupier mortgage, reduced the amount of capital borrowed during the bubble?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with Bank of Ireland (4 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: That is the problem. Mr. Boucher was central to the banks conniving with bondholders, developers and right-wing politicians during the property bubble in legal extortion of a generation of young working people in terms of holding them over a barrel for the human right of having a home over their heads. Following the collapse of the bubble and the crash in the economy, many of them are now...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with Bank of Ireland (4 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: I put it to Mr. Boucher, as somebody who was at the heart of the gouging that went on and the conspiracy of profiteering which resulted in young people now in their thirties and forties being enslaved to Bank of Ireland and other banks, that it is up to him, the banking system and the financial market sharks who were instrumental in causing the problem to come up with solutions in this regard.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with Bank of Ireland (4 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: It is clear that it is true. Did it ever occur to Mr. Boucher to get together with the other banks, the Government and other players to consider this as the solutin, rather than all of what is being proposed today, with all of the suffering it involves and the drain on the economy?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with Bank of Ireland (4 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: Yes and we know who is paying.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with Bank of Ireland (4 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: According to the documents Mr. Boucher has given us, in the Republic of Ireland owner-occupied mortgages the bank has loaned €26 billion. How much of that would be in negative equity?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with Bank of Ireland (4 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: What is the amount for negative equity for owner-occupiers?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with Bank of Ireland (4 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: The legal process-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with Bank of Ireland (4 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: These are the figures that were supposed to be presented to us in writing today. You made that point yesterday, Chairman.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with AIB (3 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: A different home, not in Priory Hall.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with AIB (3 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: In a situation where Mr. O'Grady's bank is a State-owned bank in receipt of €20 billion of taxpayers' funds and a generation of people were blackmailed into paying extraordinary speculative prices simply to have a home, and they were the victims of speculators rather than speculators, it is extraordinary that AIB has not considered a general write-down to today's value and a downward...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with AIB (3 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: Mr. O'Connor mentioned a number of times how unattractive the split mortgages so-called solution was to many people. Is it any wonder? People put in bondage ten years ago by the outrage going on in the economy are kept in bondage with unsustainable debt all their lives and Mr. Duffy wants to keep them with this so-called solution into their retirement and then he will be at their gravesides...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with AIB (3 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: That is the solution to this awful problem and suffering. AIB has loaned mortgages to 27 people in Priory Hall. Have the banks taken any responsibility for the situation of these people in the sense of the huge sums of money the banks lent to developers like this who were flouting regulations? Has the bank done a behind-the-scenes assessment of many other complexes where people have...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with AIB (3 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: In the information Mr. Duffy gave us, the total in impaired loans in the owner-occupied mortgage sector amounts to €4.892 billion and in the buy-to-let sector it amounts to €3.567 billion. What are the numbers of mortgage holders in each category?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with AIB (3 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: That is not really the information I am seeking. On the point of impaired loans, it is roughly 75% of buy-to-let-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Overview of Financial Sector: Discussion with AIB (3 Sep 2013)

Joe Higgins: The number of buy-to-let individuals must be much smaller than the number of owner-occupiers. It points to an extraordinary level of lending for speculative purposes when these loans were being given out. However, I will move on. During the housing bubble, the orgy of speculation and profiteering indulged in by banks, bondholders and developers, with the connivance of establishment...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Student Grant Scheme Eligibility (17 Jul 2013)

Joe Higgins: 88. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills further to Parliamentary Question No. 163 of 7 May 2013 and correspondence to this Deputy, his views on the case of a person (details supplied) who has been denied free fees on the basis that the springboard foundation course they completed was itself a major award [35608/13]

Written Answers — Department of Environment, Community and Local Government: Homeless Persons Data (17 Jul 2013)

Joe Higgins: 191. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government the number of persons reported as homeless to local authorities in the first and second quarters of 2013; the way this compares to previous quarters statistics; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [35712/13]

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Agriculture Schemes Payments (17 Jul 2013)

Joe Higgins: 229. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine when a person (details supplied) in County Cavan will receive their REP scheme, single payment, disadvantaged area scheme payment and grassland sheep payment for 2012; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [35712/13]