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MEMBERS OF THE Irish banking industry have launched a public consultation around the establishment of a “new, independent Irish Banking Culture Board” which they hope will “rebuild trust” in the sector.
The industry has been hit with a number of scandals in recent years, and the banks have said they recognise that people’s confidence in the sector has been damaged.
These controversies have included the tracker mortgage scandal that has affected tens of thousands of customers, the jailing of former senior executives from Anglo Irish Bank over fraud, and the near-collapse of the industry during the time of the recession.
The banking culture board will be funded by five Irish retail banks – AIB, Bank of Ireland, KBC Bank Ireland, Permanent TSB and Ulster Bank.
The new banking board will be required to publish regular summary reports to measure progress made in its aims of “promoting the highest ethical business conduct in banking” and “driving continuous improvement in culture across the Irish banking industry”.
A process to select an independent non-banking chairperson to lead the culture board is also under way, the banks said.
Staff at the five banks will also participate in two UCD-accredited culture programmes.
The online consultation will be open to the public until 10 December, and can be accessed here.
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A pure waste of time. They have no interest in doing the right thing.
@David Corrigan: Halarious, like listening to FF and FG saying they are going to address the issues we have here in the banana republic……all the banks have to do is charge normal interest rates and lets face it they have zero chance of doing that.
@David Corrigan: dead right. I’d prefer they just came right out and said we will look after ourselves while providing a service to people. “Don’t like it, set up your own bank and get cosy with politicians”.
@David Corrigan: shower of Bas***** have some nerve…..
@David Corrigan: It’s a PR Stunt.
Perhaps reduce mortgage rates to other European countries rates….After all Irish banks can borrow from ECB at 0% interest and pay very little to their depositors….
@iComment: while making hefty annual profits and yet not any pay tax for another number of years. Lemmings in the Dail letting the banks run circles around them while every working person pays the price for the recklessness and greed.
@iComment: and not rip off the average citizen??? Love to know what you’re smoking
Another point: I thought we joined a single market within the EU – why are Irish people not allowed to go to German or Polish banks and apply for loans?? Sure it would require a lot of effort to set up, but once in place would be highly lucrative for low interest banks and the customer would benefit.
@Hellenize Dublin: because we don’t have the same laws on repossessions. You can’t have equal mortgages until the risks for the banks are equalised. Would you like to have the same law as Spain which is basically miss 3 payments and the bank owns your house.
@Hellenize Dublin: “Why are Irish people not allowed to go to German or Polish banks and apply for loans??”
I remember one of the ‘selling points’ to get us to vote YES to joining the EEC was the phrase “Any goods or services available in one member nation will be available in all other member nations”. They forgot to include “But not in Ireland”, and people often wonder why I voted NO in that referendum (and EVERY other referendum since).
@John Horan: any decent comparison site would state these requirements and thus the consumer can avoid Spain and other providers that have a similar clause (buyer beware). When the market starts to dictate how low interest and favourable contracts to consumers are making the most profits, then the laws will change or the mortgage terms will change.
You seem to be providing an issue, which can be overcome through normal market forces if the right legal mechanisms are implemented.
@John Hagin Meade: as usual we were sold down the river with promises that would never become reality. And the sugar on top is the paddle will then be used to sodomize us
@Hellenize Dublin: Really you expect a mortgage taker in Ireland to be familiar with 28 different set of repossession laws when the public struggled with understanding the Irish law in 2008 (your house my be repossessed if you do not keep up payments etc.) Anyway the Central Bank refuses to let foreign banks market deposits in this country…maybe we should start there.
@John Horan: that’s just utter propaganda by the banks, they basically co-ordinate (cartelize) interest rates and charge 2,3,4 and up to 5 times the rates charged in Germany where Public / Community Banks have 70% of the market.
Our indigenous economy will never reach anything like its potential while these parasites are allowed monopolies the creation of credit.
Another attempt to convince you their on your side.
Con artists
@John ward: straight out of the FF/FG handbook haha
Start with giving people in Ireland the same mortgage rate as other Eurozone countries..
@Tim McCormack29: should we not also be insisting the EU allow us access to other providers on the continent. No incentive for our banks to reduce rates without some competition.
@Hellenize Dublin: Exactly, what about that Single Market…
@Squiddley Diddley: seems to be an great ideal to stay in the EU, but the benefits seem limited …
@Hellenize Dublin: the ideal being the single market, and its limits
Pay them less than nurses…nurses are helpful, important and kind.
Sharks and con artists them and the auctioneers.
Too little too late. The reputation of all bankers is in the gutter and rightly so. Having broke the country, they then followed that up with the tracker mortgage scandal and the selling of loans to vulture funds. These people are only interested in one thing and that’s profit.
@offtheball:
And there’s more to come ;)
They could start by stopping the sale of irish mortgages to vulture funds and then focus on dealing directly with mortgage holders that are in arrears in a fair manner rather than chucking them out on the street.
The black market on snake
Oil is thriving
What’s needed is strong Corporate enforcement and accountability (including new legislation!)including re the banking sector like Iceland not Culture boards funded by the banks!
I just started to puke there after reading that headline!!
Paying back the public taxpayer would be a very good start.
Then again, pink elephants flying over dublin airport would be more likely.
@Trevor Hayden: they would prefer to sell the bank ( that we own) to a third party and pay a nominal amount to the excequer so that they could continue to cream the profits and continue to avoid taxes. They have the politicians in their back pockets.
I wonder will this be on Leo’s list of referenda ? Right next to putting irish water out of reach of privatisation.
@Lynda Ní Mhurchú: Well said.
Seems a lot like the “drink aware” campaign.
The drinks industry were told to start a regulatory body or else the government would.
So drink aware (but keep drinking).
I’ll save them the time and the effort, here’s the he solution, it’s a simple plan i call SBC. STOP BEING CUπTS
Vulture funds fraud 43000 in debt in person repossession of middle and lower class homes putting people, family’s on the street and pushing up mortgage rate up higher deposits to get mortgages
Until such time as there is a referendum in this country which prevents the State rescuing banks, financial institutions, insurance companies etc. from collapse, the said institutions will continue to behave in a reckless manner with other people’s money!
@Will Paton: Why didn’t your party push for such a solution when in government Will?
Thieving white-collar gangsters.
How does it propose to do that?
“and the near-collapse of the industry during the time of the recession”
. It did collapse, we (with the help of our very good friends in europe) were forced to bail the most undeserving in Irish society out , meanwhile back in the real world where actions have conciquncese Repossessions, homelessness are on the increase. The only way my confidence in these traitors will be restored is when more of them are in jail for the most recent scandal ” Tracker Mortgage”
@David Lynch:
More scandalous behaviour will come out still.
Banks lied to the Irish people, and were/are essentially insolvent
Pay tax after everyone bailed ye out
@Eoin Scanlon: too right. Banks in the UK pay a levy AND a substantial contribution to the excequer in taxes. Here they just pay us the lousy levy and pay themselves huge salaries and bonuses whilst screwing the rest of us. Corrupt as hell.
They are responsible fr the collaspe of a country evicting people and now this PR STUNT.. bloody arrogance
When bankers have to do a course on honesty in ucd,its time they were sacked.
Give 20% of all banking profits to the health service, and then we’ll trust ye
‘which they hope will “rebuild trust’ hahahah this is Halloween not April fools hahahahhahahhahahah
All they need do is employ competent people & require them to behave ethically. How hard can it be?
Wasn’t this same proposal floated a year or two ago? Purely a PR exercise to present senior bankers in a more ‘responsible’ & ‘consumer friendly’ light. The bonus, commission, share allocation, fee culture is what matters to senior bankers, just as it does to credit companies. Banks are not unlimited profit making corporations. They have to carefully run their operations to avoid what too often happened too easily and too quickly in the past.
More corporate bull
Trying to justify massive pay rises
Why wasn’t AIB nationalised and the rest let go to the wall. then they all could have all fuc)ed off.
.PR exercise thats all it is, no matter what people think, they will still do their own thing.
Imagine that It’s as if Charles Boycott had thought of rebuilding his image. Restoring the homes to the homeless evicted.
1st, they should stop selling to the vultures. If they must sell a loan, it should be offered on the open market, one residence at a time.
Sooo…..that went well.
Who did they hire to this bord?
All former bank bosses and sub-bossed, with a fistful of pro-Bailout retired Politicians?
They really think we are stupid, from the cashiers up, they all treat their customers with contempt.
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