Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)

He thinks they should have nodded it through like he expects to happen in this House. In fact, those representatives identified critical omissions such as the absence of congressional oversight and that same absence is evident in this Bill. We have been given a vague, rushed Bill which was being drafted during the day as we were in this House awaiting it and we know it is an invitation to difficulty down the road. I see three options: the Paulson option, the option of pumping in equity and taking stakes or, the insurance, the guarantor, option. The Minister has opted for the guarantor option and the Bill does not tell us anything about the nuts and bolts. The Bill is essentially enabling legislation that confers the most extraordinary, far-reaching powers on the Minister who may make regulation when and as he thinks fit. It is the most all-encompassing power I have ever seen devolved to a Minister and none of the critical nuts and bolts is available to the House. Mr. Paulson would love to be Minister for Finance in this country because apparently he could do what he likes. This is what he tried to do in Congress and the Congressional members had the audacity to put a halt to his gallop.

Banks who have been lending too much to dodgy builders come in the back door to Merrion Street and make a case, presumably that one or other of them is in deep trouble, and we opt to convert the country into a massive AIG. We are one massive insurance policy now for some €400 billion. The United States has attracted much attention for putting forward $700 billion of taxpayers' money to buy back dodgy toxic accounts. This is roughly 5% of GNP in the United States. We have put 200% of GNP, theoretically, at risk here and we do not know what the Minister means when he says there will be a cost levied, how it will be levied or how it will be done. This is not the way to make law.

We are being asked to confer these powers on the Minister without any knowledge of what kind of oversight or anything else is in place. I think the delay today was caused by matters brought to the attention of the Government once it made the announcement this morning and, from what I know, those matters relate to the competition area. It seems issues were raised about the exclusion of certain banks functioning in this jurisdiction and this is what caused the redrafting and the delays that happened today. The Minister needs to address that issue. I notice the European Commission has said that distortion of competition out of proportion to risk may well be an issue it will need to examine.

I notice the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Deputy Gormley, is going to tackle global regulation as his next move and this is reassuring. However, it would be marvellous if we could tackle regulation here. The Minister's script is full of assurances about the strict regulation that will apply now. Why should it apply now, when anybody who knows anything about finance and economics, for the past three or four years in particular, has been warning the Minister and his predecessor that we would come to grief in exactly the fashion we are now dealing with tonight? Everybody was aware of that situation but we did nothing. We stoked it and expanded credit. Personal indebtedness has got out of hand. Now we have a property overhang and the Minister in his budget will probably come up with some scheme to buy back the properties from his financiers in the building industry and we are left with the mess. The taxpayers of Ireland are expected to underwrite it with their money and bail out the reckless behaviour of some of the lending that went on in this country over the past number of years. Both the Minister and I know this is the case. The people who helped him write this legislation are the ones who it appears will be able to implement it.

This morning, Deputy Kenny recommended that the new regulator ought to be represented in the big decision making. Now that they are underpinned by the State, I cannot see anything that will prevent banks acting as banks and taking decisions which we will be sorry for in the future.

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