Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

In February of 2008, in a paper "Overview of Financial Stability Resolution Issues", 8 February 2008, its on Vol. 1, page 71, of your own booklet, David Doyle booklet. Page 81 in that presentation says - this was February 2008, over six months before the guarantee - "As a matter of public policy, to protect the interests of taxpayers any requirement to provide open-ended/legally binding State guarantees which would expose the Exchequer to the risk of very significant costs are not regarded as part of the toolkit for successful crisis management and resolution." And yet, six months later, the Department did not have in its toolkit the option, where it believed, if it did so believe, that a bank was in deep, deep trouble, to strip that bank down, to protect depositors to the extent of the deposit guarantee, to bail in bondholders and effectively conduct an orderly wind-down of that bank. Why not, is the question?