Slugger O'Toole

McNarry and Foster on the PMS

I suggested a couple of weeks ago that the Presbyterian Church should use its own resources to help the investors in the Presbyterian Mutual Society. David McNarry has now suggested something which might be a little similar. He said that the Presbyterian Church has a “moral responsibility” to the savers in the Presbyterian Mutual Society who lost money. He said “…it seems to me quite clear, and I am saying this as a Presbyterian, that the church has a moral obligation itself that it needs to recognise. That’s an obligation that appears to me to be absent. My view is that the Church should go to the Treasury, not with a cap in hand saying ‘save us’, but with a plan that says we will be the guarantors for the shortfall, if you provide us with an interest free loan to be repaid after the administrator has completed his work and there’s a clear view that the value of the assets can be realised.”
According to the News Letter, a spokesman for the Presbyterian Church said it is “carefully considering all ways to help those who have been affected by the administration of the Presbyterian Mutual Society.”

Meanwhile also on the PMS Arlene Foster has said that “…over recent weeks I have heard numerous stories about how bank managers who knew that their customers had money in the mutual society contacted them directly urging them to withdraw their money and put it into the banks instead.

“The result was that the society was brought to the brink of collapse.”
She said she had already moved to try and safeguard the savings of PMS customers while a solution to the crisis was sought.