Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I want to move on to a number of other questions but there are some who will say that the ECB was too slow to act and that it risks holding for too long. We know that high interest rates can have a serious impact with regard to recessions, employment, pressures on households and all of the rest. Perhaps, in his commentary, the Governor might answer that question or say what he thinks about that response.

I also want to talk about the impact of these rates. Outside of the objective, which is to get inflation under control, there are winners and losers here. The Central Bank's own assessment has shown that 20% of households are paying an average of approximately €5,700 in additional interest when compared with last year. However, the banks are clearly winners in all of this, are they not? The Irish financial institutions have reaped a bonanza as a result of the ECB interest rate increases. The rate has gone from -0.5% to 4% and, given the fact that Irish credit institutions have €84 billion in deposit facilities at the Central Bank, is it not the case that they have generated an additional €3.3 billion as a result of the interest rates compared to the position last year?