Colm Burke (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am addressing this from a legal point of view. People appointed to serve and look after the public interest play an important role and should be there. We may not agree with their decisions or how they arrive at them but they do serve a useful purpose.

In the past few weeks some people came to me who had a loan of ¤5,000 on which the bank took a write-down of ¤2,500. Their circumstances have changed and they are in a good position to borrow to buy property. It is appalling that because of that write-down the banks are treating them as unsuitable to borrow money. That is disgraceful and outrageous. These people want to borrow 40% of the value of the property and they have more than adequate security and income to support that. If we are going to discuss the banking sector before we talk about those who are insolvent let us talk about those who are capable of carrying the loans.