Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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I thank the witnesses for their presentation. They have helped advance somewhat my knowledge of these opaque financial entities. I will have to think long and hard before I understand everything. People can call me a Luddite but this is part of the creation of a global casino in speculation. These money markets are creating a casino in speculation that is at yet another remove from any control or probably understanding of state authorities and the public and, against that background, like on the financial transactions tax, FTT, when the EU recognised that these instruments are dangerous and potentially destabilising for the European economy and want to take some action to regulate it, Ireland yet again says that while we would like to regulate and while we see the need for it, we ask that there not be too much regulation because we might lose out. That logic will scupper the FTT and has prevented us from imposing it and the same logic is being applied in this opaque area of international financial speculation. Could Mr. Carrigan respond to that allegation?

The Member, referred to by Deputy Twomey, who has raised alarms about these instruments says that one of the key features at the heart of the financial crisis was the move by banks away from prudential lending practices. Banks began to lend way more money than they had and when the loans went bad, there was a massive hole. We ended up with a massively destabilised economy and somebody had to pay the piper. Is this not the same? Money markets are so far away from prudential banking practices as to be a dangerous example of the over-financialisation of the international economy and we should try to rein them in completely, if not stamp them out. I do not see the value of them.