O'Donnell, KieranThursday, 5 November 2009 |
Dáil Eireann Debate
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I want to raise a point of order. The Government will guillotine this debate tonight. I am making a plea to the Minister not to do so.
The key amendments concerning the windfall tax, the surcharge, the bank levy and the guidelines will not be reached.
We will never get to them. That is not what this House is about.
Will the Minister go to the Chief Whip to get more time to allow us to debate this legislation at length?
Why is the Minister guillotining the Bill? This is against democracy. The key amendments have been put to the very end of the list so they will not be debated.
In the interests of democracy.
The Minister knows that. There should be a proper debate.
It is too important. Why is the Minister guillotining this debate?
It would be very much in the social and economic interests of the State that we had a proper debate on this legislation. Regarding the amendment, when one defines the economic and social development ...
I have addressed the amendment in terms of the social aspect.
In many cases in the past they were not in place.
I move amendment No. 9: In page 17, between lines 17 and 18, to insert the following: “(viii) to ensure that the measures taken in this Act restore confidence in the banking sector are reciprocated by...
I have a major issue with that. On the key issues the Minister is to bring forward guidelines on getting credit flowing but I must express my severe disappointment that he saw fit not to allow extra t...
No.
If the Minister wished, he could voice the view that he felt extra time should be given to the Bill and no doubt the Government would acquiesce to that request from him. The other issue concerns the t...
The Minister did not.
We are discussing the amendment. If the Minister reads the amendment,——
——he will see that the purpose of the Act is restoring credit, orderly property management strategy,——
——to recover the maximum funds, to take all necessary steps to prevent a recurrence of the conditions that brought about the financial crisis. The Minister can be glib and state we should not discuss...
The surcharge is a new amendment, creating a new section. It was not tabled on Committee Stage and we will never get the opportunity to discuss it.
It is critical that we get time to debate the issue of the credit flow. The Minister has tabled amendment No. 78 and the worry is we may not get the opportunity to discuss it. It is critical in term...
I thank the Minister for facilitating this discussion on a key element of the NAMA project, which may help to get credit to flow to small businesses. Fine Gael has tabled amendments Nos. 29, 32 and 7...
If only it was €28 million.
What about the Irish assets?
Why was Anglo Irish Bank nationalised then?
I have no criticism of Mazars.
It was curtailed by the information available from the banks.
On the target report, unless the banks give a breakdown between new and existing business, the report will fail again. Effectively, apart from the fact that it did not give any proper indication of r...
I would like to make one or two critical points and get some clarification. Is the Minister using amendment No. 127 as a means of threatening the banks? Rather than issuing guidelines, is he threate...
It is likely that €47 billion will be paid by way of market value and the rest will be put into the banks. If we owned 51% or more of the banks, we would control their loan books and lending policies...
I remind the Minister——
The Minister is hedging his bets.
When will we see them?
Nobody disagrees with that.
The Minister expects to produce a code in the next six weeks.
The Minister is not issuing guidelines.
With respect, the questions I asked were valid.
They were valid questions.
We are entitled to a response.
The Minister is not issuing guidelines.
Amendment put.
Voted Yes
Go on Deputy Ring.
I welcome the fact that there will be quarterly reports. I would suggest that three months is too long a period to wait for a set of accounts that do not appear to be audited. These are accounts whi...
We are discussing amendment No. 59 in the context of this group of amendments.
No, I mentioned quarterly reports.
By way of clarification, that they are not audited accounts is all the more reason they should be able to be provided to the Minister within a far shorter period than three months. In fact, in the bu...
It is historical by that stage.
It is exactly like NAMA.
It is a case of Animal Farm in terms of the Green Party.
I will speak to amendment No. 16. Fine Gael’s amendment No. 83 is related. The Minister said he has heard no new arguments in regard to long term economic value. Before he left the House approximat...
There are, therefore, questions the Minister needs to answer and has not answered. Deputy Gogarty misinterpreted the difference between NAMA buying the assets, which is not recapitalisation——
It does nothing in terms of adding to the core tier 1 ratio. A businessman looking at this would purchase the assets at market value. In that context, NAMA would have some chance of making a return....
There would be an upside for the taxpayer if the banks’ balance sheets were cleaned up. Ordinary shares would be valuable and the Minister would have some influence over lending. The Minister gave n...
The Minister said he “may” issue them.
When will they be issued and laid before the House? We need to see the guidelines.
The problem with NAMA, in terms of market value, is that it is paying €7 billion over market value. The taxpayer is taking the majority of risk in terms of market value and the €7 billion. The banks...
Has Deputy Mulcahy read the business plan?
It is good to hear Deputy Kennedy. We have not heard him in this debate for a while.
Deputy Kennedy might explain the special purpose vehicle for us while he is here.
They do not.
The Deputy might speak to the amendment now.
Extend the time for the debate.
We can do it again.
We do.
Question: “That the amendments set down by the Minister for Finance and not disposed of, with the exception of amendment No. 42, including those in respect of which recommital would in the normal cour...
Voted No
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