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

Mr. Neary, Governor Honohan said in his evidence that the regulator, by not challenging in detail many aspects of the security underlying these huge loans, that the regulators did not realise just how vulnerable the lenders were to property price declines. And even when confronted with evidence that the banks had insufficient info, the regulators failed to grasp the scale of the potential exposure. Now, Mr. Neary, throughout the 2000s, this period we are talking about, the banks were showering loans like ticker tape-----