Mr. Gabriel Makhlouf:

That is a very big question. First, there is an issue with competition. We are not responsible for competition because the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission, CCPC, is. I think I have said before - I cannot remember if it was in this committee - that at some point in the future, I expect the CCPC will want to look carefully at how competition is working. At the end of the day, we encourage competition in all sorts of different ways. I say "we", the country, as opposed to "we", the Central Bank. Incidentally, competition as a policy objective was taken away from the Central Bank a decade ago. We do not have a direct interest in promoting competition so I am talking generally. It is of benefit to the community to attract more competition. The question we particularly need to be asking ourselves is whether we think capital that is available to be invested will come to Ireland or go somewhere else. Are the conditions in place in Ireland attractive enough for people to compete with the banks? That is a fundamental question about how competition can be made to work here. The reality is that some small players have entered the market, but unfortunately some big players have left the market. It is an important issue that will require a lot of attention.