Dublin South West Sinn F\u00e9in TD, Se\u00e1n Crowe, has said his concerns over Central Bank proposals to cap the amount of money that a saver can place in a Credit Union has been vindicated by a Government commissioned report that says the organisation has seen a steep decline in their loan book. Crowe said that many of the Government\u2019s new proposals favoured the banks and failed to take into account the concerns of the Irish League of Credit Unions.<\/p>\n
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\u201cIrish Credit Unions have seen their loan book shrunk by 45% over the last eight years with much of it down to the financial crisis. Total income across credit unions fell from 562.4 million last year from 860 million in 2007.<\/p>\n
\u201cNew changes adding further lending restrictions by the Central Bank have also impacted on their viability and competiveness according to a new just published government commissioned report.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe report indicates that the fall may also have been stimulated by the new Central Bank restrictions that put a cap on the amount credit unions can lend to individuals and various types of businesses including that no more than 30% of loans be for a period of more than 5 years and which seriously undermines their competiveness against the Banks and other lending institutions.<\/p>\n
\u201cMany people expressed concern that the regulatory action, among others, by the Central Bank, and legislation from Government, would not adequately respect the unique ethos of the Credit Union movement and this government report would appear to vindicate this position.<\/p>\n
\u201cMany of the restrictions put on the Credit Union movement are discriminatory and clearly puts them at a disadvantage and needs to be addressed.<\/p>\n
\u201cCredit Unions are democratic and very well run. Only a tiny minority have had problems and these pale in comparison to the fallout from the reckless actions of other lending institutions<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are also sadly in many cases the only legitimate institution or place that people on low and middle incomes can access a loan.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe that the Credit Union plays a unique social and economic role in Irish society that requires the ongoing support of government and the Central Bank.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Credit Union sector requires and I believe demands clear and sensible regulation but implemented in a consistent and fair manner which reflects its unique model and role.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis newly commissioned government report also requires action and the Central Bank recommendation on lending limits needs to prioritised immediately in order to create a level playing pitch for credit unions and their members. \u201c<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dublin South West Sinn F\u00e9in TD, Se\u00e1n Crowe, has said his concerns over Central Bank proposals to cap the amount of money that a saver can place in a Credit Union has been vindicated by a Government commissioned report that says the organisation has seen a steep decline in their loan book. Crowe said that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[68],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2727","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-credit-union-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2727","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2727"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2727\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2728,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2727\/revisions\/2728"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2727"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2727"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2727"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}