I propose to take Questions Nos. 138 and 140 together.
The Central Bank has confirmed to me that it does not have a remit in regard to access to records.
Access rights under the Data Protection legislation are a matter for my colleague, the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality.
As I have previously said, the sale of a loan from one entity to another does not change the terms of the contract or the borrower's rights and obligations under the original contract. Any right of access under the Data Protection legislation would not be impacted by the regulatory status of the owner.
Where a loan has been restructured prior to the sale and a new contract is in place, it is this new loan contract which is sold and the rights and obligations of the borrower under the contract are not changed by the sale.
The Deputy will be aware that the Consumer Protection (Regulation of Credit Servicing Firms) Act, 2015 was enacted on 8 July 2015. It was introduced to fill the consumer protection gap where loans were sold by the original lender to an unregulated firm. The 2015 Act introduced a regulatory regime for a new type of entity called a 'credit servicing firm'. Credit Servicing Firms are now subject to the provisions of Irish financial services law that apply to 'regulated financial service providers'. This ensures that relevant borrowers, whose loans are sold to third parties, maintain the same regulatory protections they had prior to the sale, including under the various statutory codes (such as the Consumer Protection Code, Code of Conduct on Mortgage Arrears, Code of Conduct for Business Lending to Small and Medium Enterprises and the Minimum Competency Code) issued by the Central Bank of Ireland and the Central Bank (Supervision and Enforcement) Act 2013 (Section 48) (Lending to Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises) Regulations 2015 which comes into operation on 1 July 2016.