Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein)
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49. To ask the Minister for Finance when he will meet the main lenders; and if he will direct those in which he is the shareholder to reduce their standard variable rate interest rates and offer realistic solutions to families struggling with mortgage arrears that involve maintaining the family home. [17767/15]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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The lending institutions in Ireland - including those in which the State has a significant shareholding - are independent commercial entities. I, as Minister for Finance, have no statutory role in relation to regulated financial institutions setting interest rates. This is a commercial matter for the institutions concerned.

Equally, the Central Bank has no statutory role in the setting of interest rates by regulated entities, apart from the interest rate cap imposed on the credit union sector in accordance with the provisions of the Credit Union Act, 1997 and the requirement to be notified of penalty or surcharge interest imposed in respect of arrears.

Nonetheless, the issue of regulation of interest rates remains a policy area under active review. I discussed the issue of mortgage interest rates with the Governor of the Central Bank on 2 April. As a result, the Governor is currently reviewing the issue of the standard variable rates charged by the lenders and should be in a position to present this analysis to me in the next 10 days or so. I will then meet the six principal mortgage lenders in order to discuss this issue.

In addition, there have been moves on interest rates. As the Deputy will be aware, on 1 May AIB Group announced a number of reductions to its mortgage interest rates for owner occupier and buy-to-let mortgages.

A series of reductions over a fixed time frame would be acceptable to me and in that context I welcome AIB's announcement as a good first step.

The effective management of the mortgage arrears issue is an area that remains under continuous review.  More and concerted action can be undertaken by the banks to assist customers in arrears.  As the Deputy is aware the Taoiseach has previously announced that the Government is considering a range of options to support the existing framework and to improve the uptake of personal insolvency solutions.  Given the importance of the issue, his Department is co-ordinating the response across the various Government Departments and agencies and I anticipate that a detailed announcement will be forthcoming shortly.