Irish Examiner view: Vultures a convenient disguise

The most notorious high-profile case of debt which surfaced recently was that of former Kilkenny hurler DJ Carey, who had the most of €10m in loans written off in a deal reached with Allied Irish Banks. Picture: Denis Minihane

Recent high-profile cases involving sizeable debt write-offs have been headline news, and with good reason. 

Any situation where people see a famous face getting millions of euro in debt written off will draw plenty of attention.

Yesterday, readers were able to see beyond the immediate event flash of such write-offs in a long feature in this newspaper, with the Irish Mortgage Holders Organisation’s David Hall making the fundamental point that many miss — the majority of personal insolvency arrangements are for ordinary, vulnerable homeowners.

By definition, such cases are not headline news, and attract nothing like the focus of high-profile cases even though, as another contributor to the piece put it, in the courts every day there are people getting write-downs or extensions in a structured way.

In this context, it’s interesting to consider the rush to allocate blame for new trends in personal insolvency to the emergence of the now-notorious vulture funds, which have bought up many non-performing loans and which do not pursue client engagement as they push aggressively for repossession.

The idea of a faceless monolith pursuing struggling homeowners with no regard for individual circumstances is one with very few cheerleaders; vulture funds have almost become the equivalent of the cruel absentee landlords of the nineteenth century, merciless capitalists unburdened by sympathy.

Yet some of the most high-profile cases involve our pillar banks rather than anonymous corporations. The most notorious case which surfaced recently was that of former Kilkenny hurler DJ Carey, who had the most of €10m in loans written off in a deal reached with Allied Irish Banks.

The process by which the banks come to such arrangements should be a good deal more transparent, particularly during a cost-of-living crisis which is biting with families all over Ireland. 

That lack of transparency only strengthens the suspicion that there is a law of accommodation for the famous and a law of enforcement for everybody else — with vulture funds a convenient distraction.