The Central Bank's Deputy Governor has said it is evident that, in numerous ways, the banking industry has consistently failed its customers over the last decade - both in Ireland and abroad.
Speaking at the Banking & Payments Federation Ireland's national conference today, Ed Sibley said that one of the fundamental expectations of banks is that they can be trusted.
"Trusted with the funds that they hold, trusted that they will be there in the morning, and trusted to respect the primacy of their customers' needs", he stated.
But Mr Sibley said the events of the past decade have severely damaged this trust.
"Firstly, the trust in the soundness and prudence of the banking system was shown to be entirely misplaced," he told the BPFI conference in Dublin.
"Subsequently, the succession of conduct scandals, such as LIBOR rigging; mis-selling of PPI; setting up of false accounts to overcharge customers; and, closer to home; the tracker mortgage issue; and many more besides, has eroded customers' trust in their banks," he added.
Mr Sibley said there too many examples where firms - not only banks - are having to be pushed too hard by the regulator to address failings and remediate issues, where the focus is on the letter of the law and not the desirable outcome.
The Deputy Governor also told today's conference that to truly transform the banking industry for customers, "radical cultural change" is needed.
Mr Sibley said there are numerous examples, where if problems were recognised and accepted at the time they were first raised, the outcome and costs to both the firm and its customers could have been materially lower, through earlier acceptance of the problem and prevention or earlier fixing of the problem.
He noted that this incalcitrant attitude has led directly to firm failures in the recent past.
"It was, and still is in cases, prevalent in the approach to addressing non-performing loans - a European and not just an Irish experience," he said.
"It has led to catastrophic failings in dealing with customers impacted by the tracker mortgage scandal, which has done further lasting damage to the reputation of the Irish banking sector," he added.
