Seán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Deputy is absolutely right. When one stands back and looks at this it is clear that, as a result of the banking crisis, we put most of the debt into NAMA for it to manage and to get the best return for the taxpayer. NAMA is a public body audited by the Comptroller and Auditor General. It has come before this committee and the finance and public expenditure committee. There is total public scrutiny of NAMA's activity. This was part of the same exercise. There were bank debts but a special liquidation process was set up without public scrutiny, auditing by the Comptroller and Auditor General or oversight from the finance committee of the Houses or the Committee of Public Accounts. In hindsight, perhaps there should have been a subsidiary of NAMA set up to oversee the liquidation. It is too late to have that conversation now but, in retrospect, I think all the oversight we have over NAMA could have been achieved in the case of this body had we taken a different route from that of the special liquidator. However, that is a policy matter. At this stage, one of the biggest criticisms is probably that we took the liquidation of IBRC away from public scrutiny and transparency. We did not do so with the other bank debts. We put them into NAMA. That was a big call, and that is probably the essence of the reason we continue to debate this issue. There is a lack of transparency and oversight.