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usinessAfter several benefit payment cuts in 2009,with more planned in 2010, the basic unemploymentbenefit for people of working age is €196per week. Depending on the claimant’s familycircumstances they can claim €130 per week fortheir partner and €29 for each child. With the bestwill in the world, this amount is not going to paya mortgage of €200,000 let alone put food on thetable.There is a means tested benefit that providesshort term support to help with mortgage interestrepayments. It appears to be very difficult to obtainand “short term” seems to be poorly defined. In awritten reply in July 2009, the Minister for Socialand Family Affairs Mary Hanafin confirmed thatonly 12,500 people were receiving it.If so many people have insufficient help to paytheir mortgage when they lose their job, or areonly able to pay until their savings run out, thereis going to come a point where they can’t pay. Thattipping point seems to be approaching fast.Nobody seems to know just how widespreadthis problem is: what the best and worst case scenariosare after redundancy payments and savingshave been spent and there is no public moneyleft to help after NAMA bailouts and more bankrecapitalisation.Other factors that may make the situationworse include: the certainty that interest rates willrise soon and increase monthly repayments; additionaltaxes such as property tax and water ratesbeing applied to the unemployed; more benefitcuts and moving from deflation to inflation.MABS (Money Advice and Budgeting Service)are believed to be dealing with more than 30,000cases of people struggling to pay their mortgage.Minister Hanafin announced in August 2009that 19 MABS offices around the country wouldget additional staff to help deal with the increasingdemand. These additional advisors will bringto 271 the number of money advice staff workingin 65 locations around the country. Perhaps eventhe government now recognise that it is a growingproblem.It is surprising that neither the Finance Ministernor the main banks have raised any red flagsover this issue. It is noted though that the legislationfor NAMA is quite vague about what typesof loans can be taken in. Is NAMA also going tobecome a depositary for these mortgages in orderto further protect the banks?If not, then post-NAMA we may see a newIrish landlord class as banks that are currentlybeing bailed out (and will be free of toxic debt andobligations to the government) could well end upowning billions of Euros worth of repossessedhomes, after the recession in Ireland takes its tollon low paid and unemployed mortgage holders.There is also the fear that many more jobs maybe shed in the financial services sector in 2010,adding to the unemployment figures, once thebanks have obtained everything they think theyare likely to get from the government and thenfeel free to do as they please.The nightmare scenario must be getting firedfrom what you thought was a safe job with thebank, seeing your mortgage payments increaseas interest rates rise and then having your houserepossessed by your ex-employer. It is a plausiblescenario.If Ireland is floating in a sea of toxic debt, thenmortgages currently held by the unemployed mayyet be the tsunami that sinks either our societyor the banking system. Would you bet against thebanks making sure they are in the lifeboats first?This may all sound likea “back of an envelopecalculation” but thatwould seem to be in theright region given that,according to CentralBank figures, there is atotal of over €113 billionin mortgages owed inIreland.22 Fusion Magazine