Fine Gael Cork North Central Deputy and member of the Finance
Committee, Dara Murphy, has today (Wednesday) said the strategy being
adopted by Fianna Fáil in respect of a banking inquiry aims to
distract and deflect from the role that Party played in our economic
collapse, as it presided over a system of light-touch regulation and
the relentless encouragement of a property bubble.
“The cavalier attitude of some of the most senior bankers in Anglo
Irish Bank, which have been revealed this week through the Irish
Independent, have sickened the public to its core and accelerated the
need in the minds of many for an inquiry into what exactly went on in
the run-up to the issuing of the bank guarantee.
“The strategy which is being adopted by Fianna Fáil, however, in
calling for an inquiry, presided over by a judicial chair from outside
this jurisdiction, is a blatant attempt to delay proceedings and to
deflect from that Party’s failures in ensuring that the regulators
were regulating.
“The regulatory environment that operates within the State is a direct
result of the culture and the political decisions taken by the
Government of the day. If Fianna Fáil has no problem in facing up to
the truth, as it repeatedly claims, why is it taking such issue with
an inquiry being carried out by those who were directly elected by the
people to run and manage the country?
“Fianna Fáil had an opportunity to carry out an investigation of its
own choosing back in 2010. In that instance it opted to hold a
Committee of Inquiry in secret, which produced the Nyberg Report in
which not one person was named. Protestations now that the Oireachtas
could not possibly hold an effective inquiry, when it has proven to be
more than capable of doing so in the past, aims to act as a fig leaf
for the Party that created the property bubble and built our economy
on taxes derived from the construction sector.
“Let there be no mistake, an Oireachtas inquiry will not be a
substitution for criminal prosecutions. There are currently 60 charges
being brought in the case of three individuals by the Gardaí, the DPP
and the ODCE who have been building books of evidence for some time
now. The public needs answers to who met who and why decisions were
taken in the manner in which they were as our banking system hung in
the balance. Determining those answers by way of a costly and lengthy
tribunal that makes lawyers rich and bleeds the taxpayer dry is not
the answer.
“Far from propping Anglo up to the detriment of all else, as was the
policy of the Fianna Fáil administration, this Government got rid of
the promissory notes and liquidated Anglo, saving the taxpayer
billions. This Government is committed to passing the legislation to
enable the holding of an Oireachtas inquiry which is expected to be
underway by the autumn. We need answers about why we are where we are
and a timely and cost effective Oireachtas inquiry is the most
appropriate way of doing that.”
