Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

The Minister spoke about the moneys received to date being lodged with the Central Bank and also indicated that one of the banks may be in arrears. From the figures he gave, it appears that he is still due approximately €25 million on one of the quarterly payments. What does the Minister intend to do with this money? We have a situation in the public finances particularly regarding people who are unemployed. We also know that small and medium-sized businesses desperately need access to credit. Does the Minister plan on simply holding the money in the Central Bank until the end of the guarantee period — probably at around the time of a general election — at which point a large amount of money would become freely available for the Government? The Minister said he would put it back in some way into the national debt. However, that could mean anything. I would hate to think it could possibly become some kind of slush fund particularly when at the moment we need dedicated funds available to get credit flowing to small and medium businesses to keep jobs alive.

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