James Reilly (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I support my colleague, Senator Conway, and remind people that the NCBI is in Buswell's. It does important work and needs our support. I support my colleague, Senator Paul Daly and reassure him that this does not just affect rural Ireland. Last Wednesday, I was in Malahide and the only available space for an electric car that I could find was occupied by a non-electric car. The same thing happens in Leinster House, where we have two spaces and one was occupied by a non-electric car.

However, I really rise to speak about Brexit and the fact that we may face a very hard Brexit. I call on the Minister for Finance to give consideration to the following. By way of background, Charlie Weston in the Irish Independenttalked about the Irish credit unions having €17 billion on deposit but only being able to lend out €4.5 billion. That is a 27% loan to assets ratio which, in any normal institution, would be 50%. The Irish Timesreported this month that credit unions are now restricting members' deposits, primarily because the credit unions cannot put that money to work via prudent loans. In October 2018, at the invitation of the 200 year old public bank in Germany, called Sparkasse, which I have raised numerous times here, I visited its headquarters and banking academy where it trains bankers. It has its own university to do that. Its successful, sustainable banking model has worked for more than 200 years, including through two world wars, economic downturns and serious recessions. The bank is available to assist local regions. It has a long tradition of real banking, not just based on turning over property and profits. It is an old-style bank whose staff go to visit a person at a business or farm, assess risks and ability to pay, and support a person through the rough as well as good times.

I call on the Minister for Finance to urgently review the case for setting up a pilot scheme for this bank in the midland counties and in Fingal, County Dublin, to assist businesses with the challenge of Brexit. We need to provide credit to businesses in difficult times at reasonable rates. In the Joint Committee on Business, Enterprise and Innovation's report on the cost of doing business, the cost and availability of credit were two of the main challenges that businesses faced with regard to sustainability. Sparkassen could perhaps partner with credit unions or at least be allowed to come in. The report, which is good, has been with the Minister for quite a while and we should act. He needs to come to the House and tell us what he will do. By his own admission, he has two budget scenarios. One is for a hard Brexit, which will put this country in serious jeopardy, and we will need finance to sustain our people.