Financial Services
Seanad Éireann — 2026-01-28
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Mike Kennelly (FG), Labour Panel

I thank the Minister of State for the reply. On paper, it sounds good. There are checks and balances in every business, especially among banks and insurance providers, relating to the history of people who are returning. Like anything, it is a paper trail. It is about looking deep into a person's history, whether they have been away for five or ten years, or six months. It is not working with these institutions. Applicants are providing a lot of payslips and so on but some people cannot go back five years or whatever to get mortgage approval. They are moving back to rural Ireland, to County Kerry or wherever, and they cannot put a bid on a house because they cannot get mortgage approval. They can show some history of work and credit from the country they were in and they paid taxes in that country as well. They are finding it extremely hard. They wait and they are pushed out, missing the opportunity to buy the house they want in the area they want to work and live in. I welcome the point about car insurers but a lot of them not accepting emigrants as well and they are paying extreme volumes of money for car insurance. I ask the Minister of State to keep on top of this and make sure easy access is available to these people to meet these requirements when they return home.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-01-28/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:33+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-01-28