Dr. Peter Bacon:

There will not be one. I do not think there was anything wrong with the original assessment. I do not think in the present circumstances there is a basis of a bubble in the Irish market. For one thing one does not yet have a normally functioning banking sector in relation to mortgage finance. If there were a Bacon report, what would it be focusing on at the moment? It would be saying, "Why in heaven's name, seven or eight years after the collapse, are we still dealing with a mortgage arrears problem?"

To be fair to the Government, it took a calculated risk with NAMA. The principle had been applied, but never on the scale on which NAMA was done. So that problem was removed and I think wisely so because on the basis of the way in which the arrears problem has failed to get resolved, what would have happened if one had left all of the stuff that went to NAMA with the banks to resolve?

So there was a residual left with the banks to resolve themselves. They have not resolved it. A result of that is that the supply of housing to the second-hand market in the current circumstances is constrained.