Mr. Richie Boucher:

There are a couple of features and I do not know the specific area to which the Senator is referring. However, there has been a significant tightening of corporate governance procedures by quoted companies. We are quoted on the Stock Exchange. Bank directors must now be approved by the board of the Central Bank. They go through a comprehensive and extensive process. It was public knowledge that my position as chief executive of the bank had been reviewed by a third party on behalf of the Central Bank. It had analysed my role before the crisis and whether I was a fit and proper person to be chief executive. There was an independent third party report compiled for the Central Bank. It is called the fit and proper regime, a regime which applies in the United Kingdom and Ireland.

In this respect, the Central Bank has a very important role to play in deciding whether someone is an appropriate person to be a director of a bank.