Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Yes. There is no policy in the Department or at Government level to boost bank profits artificially in order that the shareholding base owned by the State will be more valuable. That is not in the mix at all. The primary interest is that the banks would operate to provide the kind of banking service a modern economy needs and would have the normal interplay of competitive banking offers in a market to support economic activity and jobs. Once that happens the shareholding will have its value anyway. There is no policy to conduct a fire sale of the shares or get money out of them because we do not need to anymore. If it were three years ago, that might be a tempting option, but not now. Was that the point the Senator raised?