David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

We are not talking about hindsight. Mr. Daly has already established and he accepts that NAMA was made aware of the success fees with PIMCO. He knew that those success fees were broken into three parts - for Brown Rudnick, for Tughans and for Mr. Cushnahan. He was also aware that there was a relationship between Mr. Cushnahan and Tughans whereby the former shared office space with the latter and that a number of NIAC meetings were held at that same premises. Mr. Daly wants us to believe that when NAMA was made aware of the PIMCO success fee, it was so damaging that PIMCO had to be forced out of the process. He also wants us to accept that we should not really be concerned that Tughans and Brown Rudnick were involved in success fees with Cerberus. The other point is that there was only a three-week gap between the PIMCO withdrawal and NAMA being made aware on 3 April of the success fees relating to the Cerberus deal. It was not as if the process took place over six months or a year - it was a three-week period. Mr. Daly went on to say that the net issue for NAMA was whether it would allow Mr. Cushnahan's alleged manoeuvrings in Belfast to seriously damage the interests of Irish taxpayers. Mr. Daly said the interests of Irish taxpayers took precedence and that there was a commercially compelling case for selling the portfolio. All of that was predicated on an outcome whereby NAMA would achieve the £1.3 billion. As far as NAMA was concerned, once it got its £1.3 billion, everything was okay.