Courts ‘need greater power’ to protect borrowers

Mortgage advocates have called for the country’s legal system to be given greater powers in the protection of distressed mortgage holders following the revelation that every major lender is in breach of the Central Bank’s code of conduct.

A Central Bank inspection of seven Irish mortgage lenders including all the country’s biggest players revealed that each were in breach of the Code of Conduct on Mortgage Arrears which seeks to ensure that customers are treated in a fair and timely manner by lenders.

The breaches included instances where a lender continued with legal proceedings against a mortgage holder despite the two parties having reached a payment agreement. In other instances, borrowers were pursued for additional ad hoc payments by their lender without any formal assessment of their ability to make such payments.