Conor Murphy (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Okay. The Bill in its totality relates to the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman and that is obviously hugely important. Having gone through its passage in the Dáil, there was a recognition that there had been a loophole in previous legislation whereby people who had their mortgages sold off, quite often without their consent, particularly to vulture funds, had not had the ability to have the protection of the ombudsman in this regard. The amendment that was secured in the Dáil and adopted by the Minister, which I am glad to hear, was aimed to close that loophole in the legislation. I do, therefore, welcome the inclusion of that. As the Minister of State will know, there are approximately 80,000 mortgages that are held by vulture funds and it was absolutely necessary to ensure these people were subject to the same protections as others.

The amendment I tabled, which I am happy to discuss with the Minister of State in the context of the section, calls on the Minister of the day to bring a report before the House on the extension of the remit of the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman to cover all mortgage holders. It is a fairly straightforward request and it was prudent given the fact that previous legislation covering the financial sector had not done what was intended, despite the best efforts of the Oireachtas. There is a chance and an opportunity to do so once this legislation has had some road testing and, perhaps, complaints have been launched with the FSPO and there are practical demonstrations of how the legislation is performing. While I do not intend to move the amendment, I would hope the Minister of State might be able to give an undertaking that the Government and the Department would come back to the Dáil or the Oireachtas at a further date to outline how the legislation is working and report back in that regard, especially given the experiences under previous circumstances.