Ms Ann Nolan:

Okay, well, as I say, I can't quite remember who suggested the idea but most of the work for it was done in the Department. We seconded ... corporate bankers from AIB, who weren't very busy at the time ... a team of corporate bankers into the Department, and had them working directly on my team there, to look at all of these very complex details. And they did the planning for us in co-operation with the Central Bank of Ireland who co-operated very strongly and in negotiation ... technically, the ECB weren't negotiating with us; technically, this was a deal between us and the Central Bank of Ireland, but, of course, there were technical discussions between my team and the ECB on several occasions. The ECB, I think, blew hot and cold on it. There were people within the ECB who felt it was a good deal and should be done; there were people within the ECB who felt it was, you know, not such a good deal and maybe shouldn't be done. But the ones who wanted to do it were the ones whose view prevailed in the end, thank God.