The plenary session next Thursday will see the package of bills on the purchase and sale of credit facilities[/QUOTE]
, which do not allow credit management companies to have access to the guarantor's personal data, while giving the guarantor the possibility to appeal both to the Financial Commissioner to denounce any access to his/her personal data and to the Director of the Department of Lands and Surveys to impose a fine even ex officio.
This was decided by the members of the Parliamentary Committee on Finance, who continued the discussion of the Bills on Purchase of Credit Facilities and Related Matters and on Real Property (Possession, Registration and Valuation). The Committee continued the debate on the Bills, following a postponement of their debate in the House of Assembly on 9 December 2021.
"What we have achieved with the changes is that an increased safety net is provided in relation to credit management companies' access to guarantors' data and management companies have no access at all to the data of collateral providers or connected persons," the Treasury spokeswoman told members of the Parliamentary Committee.
In a letter It notes that in the event that this milestone is not achieved, no assurance can be given as to the impact this may have on the expected disbursement of funding from the Recovery Fund to cover the costs of implementing the investments envisaged in the national Recovery and Resilience and Resilience Fund.
Data Protection Commissioner, Irene Loizidou Nicolaidou, spoke in favour of the changes in the bill, while in relation to safeguards, she said that "an ex-officio audit of the Artemis system, which is the platform that includes all loans, both performing and non-performing, is scheduled within the week.
The Financial Commissioner, Pavlos Ioannou, said that all the issues that had been raised during the Finance Committee meetings "have been fully addressed and in some cases", he said, "very constructive new elements and new additions to the bills have emerged" which "are extremely helpful for consumers, for borrowers and for the system in general".
He also noted that "the important element of the bill is the creation of an institutional supervisory framework for dealing with management companies," adding that the bill should now be taken to the House of Representatives for a vote.
In a memorandum to the Commission, dated July 10, the Financial Commissioner states that by removing the right of access to collateral provider and borrower-associated person data, his key reservation, as set out in his filed Memorandum, dated January 10, 2022, is fully satisfied.
He also states that, as he has publicly stated on "a significant number of occasions, the enactment of the Bills under discussion, although advanced very late in Parliament, is nevertheless deemed necessary, although its effectiveness is no longer expected to be the maximum possible."
Mr. Ioannou also said that he believes that "the passage of the Bill will be useful, given the fact of the very large stock of non-performing loans in society, which are now in the Credit Acquisition Companies and KEDIPES."
It also states that 'it should be stressed that it is essential to ensure that the new tools which the Credit Acquisition Companies and their managers will have at their disposal are not abused, which will inevitably be to the detriment of borrowers'.
"Because, such a form of abuse, may lead to loafing classes of workers and, by extension, to a further reduction in the size of the middle bourgeoisie. This creates serious risks to the socio-economic system, potentially affecting the functioning of the Republic itself."
Furthermore, the Financial Commissioner states that "very satisfactory protection of borrowers, related party collateral providers and guarantors has been achieved in the context of the amendment bills under discussion."
He adds, however, that "the effective protection of these persons can only be achieved by definitively addressing the problem of non-performing CNA
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