I thank the Minister for Justice and Equality for bringing forward this legislation. I realise it is at the request of the troika because it is part of the recovery programme. Ireland, which I love, became insolvent. For the past four years it has struggled on a life-support machine. Deputy Arthur Spring stated the banks were the engine, but they were also the main contributors, owing to lax or there being no supervision, and the conduits of the financial tsunami that caused great destruction. They have been brought through the life-support process into something of a zombie existence, but their customers remain under the cosh. Today one of the banking institutions, not one of the two large banks but Permanent TSB, came to explain its position and how it was trying to create a live bank from the carcass. Recently the Minister for Finance suggested he did not know what to believe when it came to being briefed by and getting reports from the banks. That is the truth of the matter. Despite this, the legislation expects that the customers of banks will do everything under the three alternatives in terms of a full confession, written and oral, of the full extent of their assets and liabilities. Regardless of this, even today, we do not know the position of the banks. Am I not right? We have asked about their income, provisions and categorisation of their assets, but it is still fuzzy. This is not on.

I thank those involved in the MABS because they have been on the battlefield, mostly at the lower levels of debt. Every week at least five constituents come to me with detailed stories of their positions. The financial slavery ahead of them is abhorrent and appalling. It is wrong that they cannot engage with lenders. We hear the phrase "the banks will engage", but the are not doing so. They are directing their customers and pushing them around like slaves on tea trolleys, which is wrong. We need to consider the fundamental road to well-being and the recovery of the country at every level. This applies not only at the lower or middle levels of income but also at the top. This society from top to bottom is having a financial nervous breakdown. We are on the right road and pointed in the right direction with the Personal Insolvency Bill. I congratulate those responsible in the Department where there is so much happening. The staff should be thanked for their long hours of work and diligence. At the same time, there is no point in facing in the right direction if one can never reach the destination. That is my concern. We must look at this Bill, and not be afraid to shorten the timescale of bankruptcy in the larger cases and to be rigorous about those who carry out the negotiation and the intermediation between lenders and borrowers. I would also make it much more imperative that the main creditors, especially secured creditors, are brought to heel in this because they acknowledged today that the ten years leading up to the collapse were of their own architecture and execution. It is all wrong to think that the borrowers and counter parties of that situation should be enslaved for the next number of years and we must do something about it.

I commend the Minister and his staff on their enduring work in the arduous process of getting to this point.

I am reassured that Deputy Mathews is doing constituency work. I, too, every week meet people coming into our offices. These are genuine ordinary persons who did not make a fortune, who did not go berserk but who now are in trouble. They are living in fear.

Deputy Mathews used the word "slavery". There is a new modern form of slavery in society which is called personal debt. That is having a profound effect on the quality of life of ordinary citizens. It has a significant impact on the social and economic life and the mental health of the nation.

I hope this Bill is the beginning of the journey to reclaiming the country and allowing people to be able to live without fear. There are so many today who are afraid to go home because they are unemployed, they have debt or they are bankrupt. They are afraid to talk to their wives. That is the impact on the quality of life.

Deputy Mathews is correct. I pointed out in the House previously that the banks are telling us lies. They are codding us up to our eyeballs. They come out with these great advertisements on television and radio, they bring us into briefings and they meet us to tell us all they are doing and all the money they are giving out, but they are making it impossible to work with people. The banks must recognise that we require people to spend money to do up their houses and to buy houses and small and medium-sized enterprises to be able to employ and act as a stimulus in local economies. Unless we wake up to the reality in this country, we are heading towards a continuation of the spiral of insolvency and debt.

I very much welcome the debate on this Bill. In many ways, it is the statue to 14 years of the boom and bloom of which former Taoiseach, Mr. Bertie Ahern, et al told us. This is the legacy they leave. This is their monument to where we were under their false voodoo economic carry-on. That is why it is important that we move forward with this piece of legislation and others in a suite of measures that will assist citizens.

We need resolution strategies. We need, with the Central Bank and the other banks, to ensure there is a strategy to assist those who are in mortgage arrears. It is imperative; it is critical. Equally, we must recognise that this will take time. This cannot be done in the space of a five hour debate or in the passing of the Bill.

The Personal Insolvency Bill will, I hope, act as a catalyst to the banks to work with individual borrowers in resolving mortgage arrears cases. The protection of the family home is the person's priority.

Deputy Buttimer has one minute remaining.

I must speak about MABS as Deputy Spring has done. MABS has built up a considerable database of contacts and of approaches which must be utilised in the future.

There is an expectation that the Bill is the panacea, roadmap or answer to all ills. People have felt a sense of hopelessness and of being let down and forgotten. There is now an insolvency Bill building upon other measures that can offer a way forward. Given that we are in a challenging economic environment and given that there is a Government that has gone to Europe, made the change and created a different approach in the domestic economy, we continue to commit to the protection of people. One size does not fit all. We must recognise we need entrepreneurs but we also need public services and must protect people. I hope the Bill will be the catalyst to do that.