Joe Costello (Dublin Central, Labour) | Oireachtas source

We discussed this when Department of Finance officials appeared before the committee a few weeks ago. I extended the discussion from IBRC to NAMA because of the possibility of the linkage there. Given that NAMA was established in 2010 with a ten-year remit, we are now 50% of the way through. As no market existed at the time and NAMA was seeking to bring about a market and therefore obviously prices were very low compared with that they might be later, I asked whether it would now be appropriate to have a review of the NAMA remit from 2010 to 2020.

The Secretary General went into considerable detail as to how the Department was in two minds as to whether this would be an appropriate way to move forward. The officials indicated that NAMA was now engaged in more strategic developments, such as the docklands SDZ development which will be over a seven to 15-year period. Some of the NAMA developments are no longer individual activities, but are strategic funds involving investment over a period of time.

They had an open mind as to how NAMA should go forward. It might be no harm for the committee to ask them - and NAMA - to give us a written response. NAMA has indicated that it intends to push ahead with disposing of the impaired assets so that it would have completed its work by 2018 rather than 2020. From the point of view of this committee looking at the best interests of taxpayers' money, is it a good thing that NAMA should move ahead rapidly to dispose of the impaired assets? There is now a considerable market, both domestic and international, and there is huge demand for Irish impaired assets. Huge profits are being made, as we saw with the recent Clerys debacle where 100% profit was made in the space of three years. While that was not a NAMA building per se, it happened in the context of the collapse of the property market.

Perhaps we should ask both NAMA and the Department of Finance to give their views as we are now at the mid-term of the NAMA period for dealing with what the Taoiseach referred to as the largest disposal of assets in the western world.