Ms Ann Nolan:

When the question was discussed on the possibility - and Mr. Moran talked earlier about it - we looked at many options. We have been in discussions with the troika on what to do about the promissory notes for over 12 months. We looked at many different options but when this particular option was being looked at, if we put IBRC into liquidation one had to think what one would do with the loans. Fire saleing them would clearly not be to the State's advantage since we had guaranteed the emergency liquidity arrangement, and the floating charges the Central Bank had over the assets would be unlikely to be sufficient if they were fire sales. So we had to put some sort of floor on the sale to make sure the price was held.

We considered briefly setting up a new NAMA-type structure but we decided on consultation. Obviously, it is a policy decision in the end for the Minister. The decision was taken by the Minister and, ultimately, by the Government that we would use the structure we already have - the organisation which is functioning to our satisfaction in the field - and transfer the assets there.