Independent deputy Mattie McGrath has accused Bank of Ireland of acting like ‘The Black and Tans’ in a dispute with a Tipperary businessman.

McGrath made the comments in the Irish parliament after agents for the bank seized farm and plant machinery from the contractor in the middle of the night.

The Deputy also accused Bank of Ireland finance of breaking into a neighbor’s farm to gain access to the equipment.

After branding the agents ‘thugs’, McGrath told the parliament that they had entered the contractor’s property ‘without a court order and were accompanied by police’.

Speaking under parliamentary privilege, McGrath said “The Acts don’t matter to these people. They came in the dead of night, broke in through a neighbour’s property. Another neighbour driving to work in Dublin noticed the action and alerted the contractor.

“The machines were simply taken to an auction house. I tell the people to stay away from those auctions. They are buying people’s misery.

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 “The Black and Tans didn’t do it. The landlord didn’t do it with the sheriff coming in for evictions.

“There men are nothing short of cowboys. They even stole other equipment not contracted to Bank of Ireland Finance including a Massey Ferguson 6490, and drove it back an hour later when they discovered it wasn’t the right tractor.

“They also took a hedge cutter worth €20,000 which was with a different finance company, Woodchester Finance. Now Woodchester have informed them that Bank of Ireland kindly passed this over to them and they’re keeping it as well.

“The machines they took were between four and six years old and they were almost finished their payments.”

McGrath was highly critical of the police involvement in the repossession.

He claimed: “The gardai (police) were in a paddy wagon and sat for 40 minutes while the thugs loaded up the equipment. The gardaí accompanied them around Tipperary for hours and the five thugs were in a repossessed jeep with no tax or insurance disc.

“The public are paying for these banks and the State protects them and allows them to carry it out.

“This contractor is of good standing. It is one thing to come during the day but they came in the dead of night. It was State terrorism.”

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