Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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I have to interrupt Mr. Sheridan on that. I heard the phrase "properly run" and must challenge it. The point of regulators is precisely to deal with people who do not do business properly.

To throw it back and say some firms do not behave as they should is not acceptable. Sure, if they all behaved as they should, there would be no need for regulation. The reason the Central Bank is there and we need laws and regulation is that we know there are many in cut-throat, profit-driven, competitive markets, including insurance, who do not play by the rules. There are cowboys left, right and centre. We had it with Quinn. I am only speculating, but it looks like this gang was up to the same thing as Quinn. It appears they were under-provisioning as they were using the money for other things, as Quinn was. Money that should have been applied to provision against losses was being used to leverage other business deals elsewhere. That is what he was doing.