Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 10 June 2015

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis

Nexus Phase

Ms Mary O'Dea:

We did bring in specialists. We brought in two types of specialists. We brought in auditing specialists and we also brought in valuation specialists. And I think it was really with the two of those working together, particularly the valuation specialists, that allowed us to get a much, much better understanding. And actually, one of the things that I noticed clearly in 2009, when we did actually bring in particular types of very specialist staff into the regulator, the value of those staff in terms of being able to even have that conversation with the banks of the type of land, the value of land, what type ... of whether it was land bank or whether it was close to development or anything like that ... those conversations, to me, became much richer and much more meaningful when we had our own specialist staff in those areas.