Alan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I think I have proved my point. I will move on. I have a limited amount of time.

Lazard is constantly being referred to here. Let me just say this, I, personally, would never hire the company from what I have seen here. For me, this is a box-ticking exercise. Its role was bizarre, and I have referenced this previously. Mr. Soffe, in his opening statement, stated, "I and other Board members were satisfied, based on Lazard's unequivocal expert advice ...", but it is easy to get the expert advice if one defines the role in such a limited way that it has to give the answers that one wants. Does the idea that it was not required to do the value of the loan book earlier on, that the marketing exercise was fairly limited, as has been outlined by my colleague and which I will not go into now because I do not have time, and that, in relation to their post-analysis of the sales process, they were not informed of the fact that there were payments being made show that its role in this was merely a box-ticking one?