Mr. Jeremy Masding:

The Deputy will be aware that Permanent TSB has a long journey to recovery. At the heart of banking is having a strong balance sheet. The management team inherited a weak balance sheet with, for example, much too much dependence on system funding. Current accounts are a valuable source of funding. They are sustainable - they are "sticky", in banking parlance. By putting the threshold at €1,500 and by getting 60,000 and more accounts I can assure the Deputy that is a valuable resource for our bank's balance sheet.