Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)

I want to revert to the original point I made. The Minister needs greater clarity on the significance of December 2010. If he is withdrawing this cover, even if not abruptly, if there is a hint that something will change in 2010 we need to know the criteria against which it changes. This, we understood, provides cover for people. People in this area need certainty above all else. If a review process is to be triggered in 2010 we need clarity on the exact nature of that review, whether the Irish Government has complete control over it and the Minister can make amending regulations, or whether there is a possibility with the new framework we will have from Europe that the Irish system may be told by Europe what the provisions are to be. We need clarity and I was not quite happy with the Minister's answer.

On the wider issue, the taxpayer is shouldering more responsibility, even in this measure, as well as in other measures we have yet to discuss. There is the sense that there must be a quid pro quo in this. One of my lingering feelings on this is that the offences are far from clear in our law. The long period during which the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement is assembling the case and the doubt as to whether some things that, to the layman, seem clearly wrong may have escape hatches based on strong legal advice suggest to me that, as one of the quid pro quos, we need to tighten our law. There needs to be a much clearer black and white definition as to what is unlawful. It would seem that regulators were in some doubt themselves and activities that, to the layman, were appalling seem to regulators to be in a grey area. It is very unsatisfactory if the professionals see things that we see clearly as black as being grey, which seems to have been the case. I do not pretend to have an encyclopaedic knowledge. The way in which it developed where explanations were offered and appeared to have been accepted, and legal advice was offered and appeared to have been accepted, seem to an outsider to be appalling practice and designed to conceal rather than reveal what was going on.

The Minister talked about the architecture of regulation and the role of the Oireachtas within that architecture, which is important. However, as he said in his closing comments, the architecture is considerably less important than the policies and the people who police them. We need a statement from Government as to the new policy, the new types of offences and the new approaches to operating that policy as well as Oireachtas oversight.

The issue of Oireachtas oversight arose when we discussed the Central Bank of Ireland legislation. Plainly, the Oireachtas did not have the forensic skills. We were presented with a much rosier view of what was going on than was the case by Central Bank of Ireland officials. There was a sense that they were also wearing the green jersey. The Central Bank of Ireland regulators felt it was their duty to tog out and show they would not undermine the international view of Ireland's system. That seems to be an inherent problem that needs to be overcome. I do not know whether it was unwillingness to look hard or they felt that patriotism dictated that they should present things in a certain way. That issue will remain as a problem that we will need to address. The architecture could be a major distraction from what the real issue should be, which is the policies and the people and the whistleblower attitude rather the donning the green jersey attitude.

Progress reported; Committee to sit again.

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