Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 27 June 2023
198. Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh asked the Minister for Finance for an update on domestic and EU plans to protect the use of cash in our society and economy; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [30632/23]
View answerIn recent years, the banking landscape has changed significantly in Ireland. The number of banks serving the sector reduced from 12 to 3 as banks were amalgamated or closed down and foreign owned entrants exited the Irish retail market. There has also been a considerable acceleration in technological developments and the pace of uptake has been accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic. With that has come a decline in cash usage.
Cash usage can be looked at from two sides: access to cash and acceptance of cash.
In November 2022, the Retail Banking Review was published by my Department. It concluded that, despite the decline seen in cash usage, cash remains an important element of the payments system and the broader economy and it is essential that cash remains readily available to customers through ATMs and other means across the country. It also concluded that there was still reasonable access to cash at the moment but noted that neither the Minister for Finance, nor the Central Bank, had any powers to ensure this.
Accordingly, the Review recommended that the Department of Finance should develop Access to Cash legislation and prepare heads of a bill in 2023 with the initial objective of developing criteria that would secure access to cash at about the levels prevailing in December 2022 but also provide for such criteria to be amended appropriately in future as and when cash usage declines further. The key objective is to ensure that evolution of the access to cash infrastructure does not move ahead of society's needs and expectations and that the future evolution is handled in a fair, transparent and equitable manner.
Under the bill, ATM operators and CIT companies will be also be authorised and supervised by the Central Bank in order to protect the resilience of the cash system.
The Retail Banking Review also recommended that the Department of Finance should lead on the preparation of a new National Payments Strategy to be ready in 2024. The Strategy should be informed by, and aligned with, the retail payment strategies of both the EU Commission and the Eurosystem.
The Strategy will set out a roadmap for the future evolution of the entire payments system, taking account of developments in digital payments, the use of cheques and other issues. It will also examine how future changes should be made to the legislative Access to Cash criteria.
Importantly, it will consider and consult on whether to legislate pre-emptively to give the Minister for Finance the power to require certain classes of firms, sectors or sub-sectors to accept or facilitate (to an appropriate level) the acceptance of cash and whether it should be Government policy that public bodies should accept or facilitate the acceptance of cash for the payment of goods, services, taxes, levies, fees or charges.
Finally, at EU level, it is expected that the Commission will publish a proposal on legal tender later this month that will likely include measures that will aim to ensure everyone in the Euro Area will have sufficient and effective access to cash and that there is greater acceptance of cash across the board.
