Michael Ahern (Cork East, Fianna Fail)

Since the middle of last year the Government made a decision to secure the banking sector, not for the benefit of individuals in, or directors of, the banks but for the benefit of the people, those who have deposits in the banking system, for the trade and commerce which could not operate without a banking system. It is not perfect but if the Government had not made that decision the banking system would have collapsed. In order to make it more successful, it is necessary to clean out the banks, which NAMA will do. That will enable banks to extend more credit to those who are having difficulty getting it now.

The British Central Bank printed billions of pounds and put them into the economy to keep the system alive but that has not worked. The United States printed trillions of dollars and put them into the system but that has not kickstarted the economy in the way it had been hoped. As Deputy Fleming said, people watching Sky News can see that the same, if not worse, is happening around the world.

The Government has proposed NAMA to make the banks operable again. An asset purchase scheme has a threefold goal. It can remove the distraction from bank management of trying to recover problem loans, and allow it to refocus on new, sound lending which is essential for the future of the economy; it can help improve loan recovery by separating that task from the team that made the loans; and it can replace assets of uncertain value with safe and marketable assets. There will be further discussion on this but a similar scheme succeeded in Spain, Sweden and the United States but not in Ghana, Mexico, the Philippines and Senegal which are undeveloped economies. When we get these systems going the banks should look sympathetically on people who are having trouble repaying their mortgages and reduce the interest charges to 1.75% for the next four or five years while the economy is in recovery mode.

Opposition spokespersons have said time and again that nothing is being done to promote enterprise and employment. This is another lie.

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