Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Can we tease that out because there is a little lack of follow-through of information on behalf of the taxpayer that I will ask Mr. McDonagh to revisit, if I am hearing him correctly. He will understand when I make clear what I am coming at. When NAMA was being set up, approximately €70 billion of loans were transferred to it at whatever figure. There was approximately 50% of a discount, and there were different levels of discounts depending on the particular bank. From recollection, and Mr. McDonagh will appreciate I have not looked at this recently, NAMA had a much bigger write-down in respect of the Anglo Irish Bank loans. They came at a bigger discount whereas the Bank of Ireland loans that came to NAMA were probably a little better. Of the loans transferred to NAMA, the taxpayer knows the banks from which they came. It is only right at the end of the process, and Mr. McDonagh said NAMA is nearly there, or at least 70% there, that we would like to know the outcome with regard to those. Mr. McDonagh is saying that in his handling of it he could have had a debtor who had loans across the institutions. That is fine, but I am putting Mr. McDonagh on notice, in the interest of accountability and transparency, that we would like to see the outcome in terms of the way those loans of financial institutions actually worked at the end of the day because that will tell us how much Anglo Irish Bank, AIB, Bank of Ireland and Permanent TSB or whoever cost us.

However, if Mr. McDonagh is telling us that at the end of that process the loans NAMA took in from Anglo, for example, book debts of €20 billion, we need to know at the end of NAMA's work what we got back out of that €20 billion. Did we get €25 billion or €12 billion? Mr. McDonagh seems to be telling me now that in terms of that line of accountability and traceability with regard to what happened the biggest financial institution and property management company in the State, it is possible we might lose that. I am saying we cannot lose it. The Irish taxpayer will want to know that final breakdown. We know what we gave NAMA. The Irish taxpayers know the write-down in terms of what went in. They are entitled to know what came out at the bottom end for those relevant institutions. I think Mr. McDonagh gets my point.