Joe Higgins (Dublin West, Socialist Party) | Oireachtas source

There has been a lot of comment on the role of auditors in relation to the period of bubble and bust. And just to try and understand, we get people watching us from the stand and indeed, myself. Let me just put this short analogy to you and ask you if you think it's fair or not. So a patient comes to a GP for a heart check and a blood pressure check. Doctor checks the two ... "You're grand in those two fronts ... good luck", not mentioning ''by the way you have a serious tumour that should be checked out.'' So time passes, tumour develops ... catastrophe for the patient ... doctor says, ''Don't blame me, I reported on what I was supposed to.'' So, patient is the bank being audited, doctor is the auditor. In Ireland's bust and bubble or bubble and bust, would that be a fair analogy or not?

It's an analogy. I don't think it's a fair one. I think the reason I would feel that there is some question about it is the patient in your analogy has to explain his symptoms, and so they have to be measurable. So if the patient has some issue that can't be predicted - because it's something that's about ... that is unseen and is about to happen in the future and doesn't share that with his physician - I'm not sure the physician will call out that issue. I agree with you if the physician or the doctor saw that there was an issue and didn't call ... that was clear and identifiable and there was objective evidence that the person had this condition and then just ignored it, that would be different. I don't know whether that answers your question, Deputy.