Mr. John Moran:

I want to make one small correction. The Department reacts to the names submitted to it by the boards of the banks. This is not a case of the Department shutting people off from engaging in the process. My understanding of the last process that AIB ran is that it tried to use professional firms to source people for this role with a competency that is suitable for the amount of money the State has invested in that bank in terms of running and moving the bank to the next level. I do not believe, and I hope Deputy Ross is not suggesting, that the agencies used by AIB or indeed the board of AIB have been shutting people off from participating in those competitions. We are reacting to the people and the lists of names given to us as to whether we can trust the management we have chosen to run the bank and trust the various people they engage to try to source people across the rest of the world. We have not confined this to Irish people but have encouraged them to look elsewhere so as to have a larger pool of potential candidates. If one has people, there are channels by which these people can do it. We certainly have not been exercising any veto at the Department over people who have been coming through to us that way.