Ireland needs to make renting much more attractive to tenants and landlords to take the heat out of the housing market and prevent the chances of another housing bubble, a deputy head at the Central Bank has said.

The new Central Bank rules on mortgage lending will be introduced immediately once they are agreed next week.

The Central Bank is unlikely to change the new rules on mortgage lending despite growing political pressure.

House building in September grew at its fastest pace since Ulster Bank first began its Construction Index 14 years ago.

The majority of home-buyers will in future have to put down a 20% deposit and be able to borrow a maximum of 3.5 times their salary, according to new rules by the Central Bank.

The Central Bank yesterday announced a new chief economist, Gabriel Fagan, who will take up the role in October having left the ECB.

Plans by the Central Bank to reinstate bonuses and pay rises for high-earning officials are an insult to people struggling to survive post-recession Ireland, anti-poverty groups have said.

The Central Bank is considering pay increases and bonuses for senior staff and all employees, as well as other ‘reward models’, as part of an internal review.

Real and lasting financial sector reform will only be achieved with a cultural change in mindset in both the public and private sector, a senior figure in the Irish Central Bank has stated.

The ex-director general of the Central Bank has been rehired to oversee the implementation of the National Payments Plan Steering Committee.

Progress on establishing a European banking union is uneven and stalled in some areas, but it is necessary for the European Stability Mechanism (ESM) to recapitalise banks and overcome eurozone tensions, deputy governor of the Central Bank, Stefan Gerlach said yesterday.

European markets continued to be mixed yesterday as investors sought to lock in profits garnered as a result of last week’s uptick.

The Central Bank has warned that Ireland's efforts to exit the bailout programme could be hampered by the prospect of a sharp slowdown in economic growth or a rise in mortgage arrears.

Ireland has a limited safety margin for maintaining debt sustainability and would benefit from a deal to reduce the cost of bailing out its banks, said Stefan Gerlach, a deputy governor with the central bank.

Running budget surpluses is the most effective way open to Ireland to reduce the economy’s debt burden over the longer term, Deputy Governor of the Irish Central Bank Stefan Gerlach believes.

Raising interest rates is not the best way to deal with the fallout from erratic property lending, the deputy governor of the Central Bank has said.

JOBS Minister Richard Bruton has denied any tension between the Coalition partners over the breach of a pay cap for his adviser, Ciaran Conlon.

The Central Bank of Ireland has today announced the appointment of Stefan Gerlach as deputy governor.