Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)

Deputy Feighan asked about profile statements by financial institutions, breaking down their lending between different sectors in the economy. In fact, they have published such information in the past. Under the scheme it would be possible to require the publication of such information. It does not present any difficulty. One cannot assume that a particular sector is toxic in its entirety, of course. No matter how one classifies books or analyses the sectors, one must remember that much of the loan book can still be good. Quite an assumption has been made in the debates here and in the Upper House that lending in the construction sector is automatically in default, which is not necessarily the case.

Deputy Ned O'Keeffe raised a number of points. First, the relevant bank auditors do report to the regulator, whose staff have sight of the information referred to by the Deputy.

Regarding whether I can remove a board member who is a total fool, paragraph 34 states:

A covered institution shall comply with any direction from the Minister or the Regulatory Authority, or both, to take specified steps to restructure its executive management responsibilities, strengthen its management capacity and improve its corporate governance.

I suppose if a director was so impossible as to be an impediment to good corporate governance I might, on a construction of that provision, have power to do so.

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