Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

The new board is also reviewing all the corporate governance practices of the bank and will put arrangements in place to guide the bank in the future.

It is important that Anglo Irish Bank customers and depositors can be sure their savings are being safeguarded. While I understand people's anger about these matters, it is action that will deal with this issue. There is a very serious situation with which we must deal. As the House knows, we brought forward a guarantee system in September in order to bring stability to the banking system in the interests of protecting businesses, protecting as many jobs as is absolutely possible and making sure people can conduct their business in the normal way with a functioning banking system. That guarantee will be paid for by those who avail of it to the tune of approximately €1 billion during the course of the term in which the guarantee is provided to those institutions.

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