Martin Conway (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I support calls made this morning asking for a further analysis of the banking sector in this country. We are in a battle with our banks, unfortunately, and it is a battle we have to win. Very recently, I spoke to a gentleman who had had a meeting about his distressed mortgage. He came out of the meeting feeling shaken, chastened, depressed, disturbed and utterly humiliated. He said he would have been treated better by the worst moneylenders in operation - that was how badly he felt he was treated.

We need a code of ethical conduct to be established as a matter of urgency as to how banks engage with and speak to people who try to get their mortgage situation addressed. This gentleman at least engaged with the bank; many people do not because they are too frightened. This is becoming a national crisis and we need to deal with it in those terms. It is both a crisis and a battle. We, as a State, must win that battle, not the banks. We owe it to our people.

Like other members of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality, I visited St. Patrick's Institution a number of months ago. I commend the report and fully support its proposals. It is absolutely necessary that we have a full judicial inquiry into the appalling circumstances and behaviour mentioned, not only of former staff of St. Patrick's Institution but also of the Department of Justice and Equality which, it would appear, was totally involved in this sad and sorry situation. What went on is appalling and we owe it to the young people who went through that institution to establish some kind of truth commission.