Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)

I am concluding now. In today's edition of The Irish Times, he states:

The charge to the financial institutions should be set at high levels to compensate for the risks that taxpayers are being asked to take. If a bank or building society refused to pay those charges, then that institution should not have been included in the scheme. . . The Government is putting at risk public funds to provide financial institutions with an extremely valuable insurance policy.

Public funds are being put at risk and the essence of Deputy Burton's amendment is the following. If Hank Paulson was in this country, he would not be able to believe his luck. Does the Minister think that Hank Paulson would get away with a Bill like that on Capitol Hill? He tried it and he did not succeed, and the representatives of the people were heard and were entitled to be heard about the deficiencies in the two and a half page Bill that became a 100 page Bill. All Deputy Burton is asking for is that we have the necessary elaboration from the Minister in specifying the terms and conditions that will apply to the provision of finance. We are not saying that we should hold up the progress of the Bill — let it be concluded — but we are saying that we should see the terms and conditions applied by the Minister because that is where the nuts and bolts rest in this scheme. People reasonably ask us what the Government is getting back. We need to know that before the provisions of this Bill become operational.

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