Peter Mathews (Dublin South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

London is a jungle in the off-balance-sheet shadow banking world. An article entitled "MF Global and the great Wall St re-hypothecation scandal", published on 7 December 2011, states the dangers and fragility of the investment banks around the world and how they could collapse all the supposedly solid high-street banks, the repositories of savings of households and companies.

We need to employ an iron fist and to have great leadership in Europe. Dancing around the problem and lurching into ideas regarding financial transactions taxes are not sufficient. We must think about muscular financial engineering to solve this.

London should be exposed for what it is. It is carrying out rehypothecation on a scale that is absolutely radioactive, and people cannot even measure the radioactivity.