Róisín Garvey (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Aire Stáit as teacht isteach. Tá obair an-tábhachtach á déanamh ar an dlí seo, mar sin gabhaim buíochas leis. This is an important Bill. I thank the Minister of State for all his work on this. All too often, consumers fall prey to great offers of hire purchase agreements. As someone with a degree in mathematics and physics, I find some of the calculations in hire purchase agreements really complicated. It ends up being much more money than it looks like when agreements state 4% or 6%, since there is compound interest, cumulative interest and interest rates on interest. It is insane.

I welcome this Bill from the Government. It relates to the regulation of buy now, pay later plans, personal contract plans, and related financial products, such as hire purchase agreements. With the cost of living rising, we will probably see much more of this happening and people moving towards that model of purchasing, which is why this Bill is important. It would bring providers of these financial products into the regulatory remit of the Central Bank. It will require these providers to include the annual percentage rate in hire purchase agreements. We all know how we can fall prey to advertising. It is really important. A great advertisement used to have someone saying he did not know what a tracker mortgage is. It is also the case with hire purchase agreements. I do not know what APR really means.

It is great that this Bill was amended on Committee Stage. I welcome the legislation. It is a significant step to bring these lenders into the remit of the Central Bank, which will provide greater protection for people who use these services. These providers are not currently required to conduct background checks or suitability assessments on customers. It becomes difficult. I know people who have been caught out by this. They wanted to get an expensive present for their child for Christmas, because everybody else was getting it. They gave into that and took on a loan that they could not fulfil. It is unfair that lenders have been getting away with this. This Bill will help the most marginalised in some ways, which is why the Bill is important.

One striking issue was that the collection of data was not regulated. People who had bought something on impulse and were unable to pay it back were pursued by unlicensed debt collectors. We have all heard horrendous stories about those situations. As I understand it, previously, companies could outsource their debt collection to private debt collectors. They were not subject to regulation if the original company was not subject to regulation. It shows how badly needed this legislation was.

There has been a significant increase in recent years in the number of PCP arrangements, particularly for buying cars. We need to be careful about consumer protection. Does this Bill mean that debt collection by lenders providing hire purchase agreements, PCPs and buy now, pay later arrangements will now be regulated and brought under the remit of the Central Bank? They are debt collectors working for the companies that are offering the loan. Will the Minister of State clarify this issue for people who fail to meet repayments?

In the world we live in, we have become interdependent. The EU has failed to be able to tell Putin it will not buy his oil or gas because we are so dependent on it, even though I know the Irish are coming out stronger than other EU states. We need to look at our buying power, what we are buying, where it is from, if it is ethically made and where it is sourced. We have a climate emergency and significant issues with fast fashion. Sometimes these low interest loans can tempt people to buy things that they really do not need, or perhaps they get it from Amazon or somewhere. If we are buying, let us try to buy ethically, from Irish companies. People can buy hoovers from their local electronics shop in the heart of their local town as opposed to online or by driving to some warehouse belonging to a millionaire who has 50 shops. We need to look at our power as consumers. If we borrow money, let us try to support small, local, indigenous businesses that have ethics and morals relating to their staff and where they source their goods.