Mr. Lar Bradshaw:

We need to be really clear on this. I am here today as the former chairman of the Dublin Docklands Development Authority. Is the Deputy suggesting that the board of the authority in 2006 should be held accountable for decisions made by privately owned banks then and for the following two or three years and the decisions of Government and Ministers for Finance both in 2008 and 2009? Is the Deputy suggesting that the board of the authority is responsible or should be held accountable? Would he recognise that at the point at which the authority was making this decision it had an expectation in foresight that the bank that was lending the money was a privately-held institution? This is such an important point because people have said - and have confused this issue - that the taxpayer has lost money. All I want to do is assure the taxpayer, based on the behaviour of the board of the Dublin Docklands Development Authority, not decisions that were made in latter years, the State and the taxpayer did not lose money. In fact the State made a gain as I have described it. That is really important to me.

I acknowledge that the authority lost money. I am happy to hold my hand up and say I was the chairman of a board that made a decision that at this moment in time I cannot escape from the fact that the authority lost money. I am absolutely willing to accept that and I would like to discuss that at some point and how I feel about that. Please, I do not think it is fair of anybody on this committee to suggest that the board of the authority should be held responsible for decisions by banks and Ministers for Finance in years afterwards.