Aideen Hayden (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for attending today. This legislation was previously discussed by the Joint Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, of which I am a member. It is very welcome, as I am sure a lot of people never thought they would see themselves in a position where a loan they originally had with a well-known high street Irish lender would find it being sold on and administered by a third party. This will ease the disquiet of a lot of those people.

While this will cover some of the issues, particularly around the extension of the code of conduct on mortgage arrears, we will have to keep an eye on the practices of firms which have secured distressed loan books. They did this to make a profit and there are other aspects to the arrangements, such as the rate of interest charged, over which they will have a free hand and they may do business in a way in which a traditional high street bank would not. I ask the Department to keep a close eye on this. We now find ourselves in a new situation and we need to keep an eye on how these businesses progress. Ordinary citizens who took out loans with high street names now find themselves in a position they could never have envisaged so I ask the Minister to keep this under review.