Michael D Higgins (Galway West, Labour)

I will try to be brief. Deputy Edward O'Keeffe's speech should do wonders for share prices. If it does not, we have just no hope at all. I would like to focus specifically on the amendments before the House. When I attended last evening's launch of a book written by Senator Ross, I learned about the packages that were negotiated by some of the people at the tops of the banks. It seems that some of those referred to by Deputy O'Keeffe were far less influenced by heritage than by their views of appropriate compensation. They decided they needed €1 million a year, or sweeteners for the future in terms of options. My Labour Party colleague, Deputy Burton, has said that although we will support amendment No. 2, we regard amendment No. 4 as more important because it will provide the transparency that is needed. Now that Second Stage has been passed, Committee Stage has been discussed and some changes have been promised, Deputies on all sides of the House agree that we want the legislation to be as good as possible. I thought the Minister for Finance had accepted on Committee Stage that there is a need for a significant change in culture. I hope I was not mistaken in placing my belief in that. Such a change is absolutely essential. We could not go on as we were.

I wish to pick up on the comments made by Deputy Burton when she quoted from material she received on foot of a freedom of information request. It is clear that PricewaterhouseCoopers worked as a financial consultant to the Financial Regulator, which let us down. In its own communication, Merrill Lynch described itself as a financial adviser to the Department of Finance. It is plain that both companies, which were rewarded over the rate, let us down. A communication between the Government and the European Central Bank, which has been mentioned, stated that the Governor of the Central Bank believed that Anglo Irish Bank was of systemic importance. That is also disgraceful.

I want to make clear where the oversight committee and the Oireachtas committee are required. What is at stake is a degree of vigilance, accuracy of information and commitment to the public interest that did not exist heretofore. With regard to the two committees, one should note there is across the water an interesting discussion taking place on Professor Nutt's relationship to the British Cabinet as an expert adviser. Later amendments will cover gagging as it arises in respect of the role of an independent, intellectual, public-interest voice. In the case of Professor Nutt, it is suggested that, under the Westminster model, the British Government practically owns the mind of the person involved. What we now need is an entirely different approach to transparency and the question of expert advice.

Amendment No. 4 concerns an extremely important topic, the oversight committee. Deputy Edward O'Keeffe is at least straightforward about what he is suggesting, that is, that the committee be the Government's committee. According to the legislation, unless we amend it, not only will it be the Government's committee but the Government's committee with the neutered expert. The expert will be neutered in so far as he will not be free to express an opinion. If ever there were proof of the need for independent public-interest-driven people, this is it. I refer to people who know the complex structure of financial markets but who are free to express their opinion. This is needed urgently in regard to the provision of information in the public interest through an oversight committee and in a policy sense with a view to discussing whether one is achieving liquidity, which everyone agrees is necessary. It is needed in respect of the Oireachtas committee. However, one cannot achieve this if committees are structured as they are at present.

I will leave for another day the flaw in our legislative process whereby the Government has a monopoly on the right to introduce legislation. We would be better served by the Scandinavian model, under which significant committees have blocks of expenditure and are transparent and accountable. Not only can such committees change legislation and make it accountable, they can also introduce it. We are paying a high price for our very old, undemocratic, unaccountable form of decision-making. However, we have what we have in this regard.

The Minister agreed in his reply on Second and Committee Stages there was a need for a break with the past. Consider the circumstances if one does not break with the past and continues to allocate €240 million per year for the purchase of expert opinion. We must ask whether it is not in the public interest to know how we have operated in the past. We paid €7.4 million to Merrill Lynch to tell us Anglo Irish Bank was sound when it clearly was not. Equally, the Governor of the Central Bank provided a letter to state Anglo Irish Bank was of systemic importance. This provokes a theological debate on how a bank can be a niche bank. By this I mean a person deals with a particular person in Anglo Irish Bank in respect of a particular project and is coached on how to go forward with his speculation, be it national or international. How can a bank do this and be a systemic bank? A bank can only be a systemic bank according to such a theological argument if one says the entire system is speculative, unaccountable and going down the Suwannee, as our system very much nearly did. Anglo Irish Bank was never of systemic importance. It was a disastrous mistake to include it in the guarantee, from which we have been seeking to recover.

With regard to oversight, one needs to use both committees in a way that will make a significant break with the culture of negligence. The various people responsible have gone away into the sunset. What they did in regard to the banking system was appalling. If we are to envisage consultancy fees of €240 million per year, we must not have more of the same.

If one says in a letter that Merrill Lynch is the financial adviser to the Department, one must ask by whose decision. The decision in this regard was a disastrous, overpriced decision and we cannot have more of that. That is why we need an oversight committee that will be at arm's length from the people who are taking some of the decisions. It must have a degree of independence to ensure information will be available to all sides and all members. The Oireachtas committee must have regard to what I stated about the contracting of services, the valuation of debt or, for example, the manner in which bonds are issued. I refer to the question of whether a distinction might be drawn between bonds issued generally in respect of an entire institution or packages of bonds that carry different levels of risk. These are points on which people have opinions.

I believe Deputy Edward O'Keeffe's views are genuinely held. He is taking the cover off the notion that there are some people who simply understand all of these matters and that the public and elected representatives do not. He implies there are some special people who understand this subject. They are highly priced people who will not get out of bed except for €1 million per year and they become insecure if they do not have share options. If they want to change position, the share options must travel with them. They also expect a retirement package. If something goes wrong and they have to leave, they have to be sent off with a blast of gold that would frighten anybody. This is nonsense.

When considering accountability, we must ask what we are elected for. We are elected to answer questions on the street. Very straightforward people ask me what has happened the people who made all the bad decisions. I refer to the Secretary General in the Department of Finance at the time in question, the Governor of the Central Bank, the regulator, all the supporting staff and those involved with all the contracts. They have all walked away. The Minister needs to make it clear he has made a break with the past in this regard. It must not be a case of going back to the people whom one supposes know how to do business, as Deputy Edward O'Keeffe suggests. If they did know how to do business, they did a very bad job of it. People are paying the price for this, no matter how often one disagrees. Our ability to create a flow of liquidity, such as is needed to save businesses and jobs, is connected to the price we are paying for saving a banking system that has been wrecked. It is insulting to one's intelligence to suggest these are two separate questions. They are analytically distinct if one wants to structure proposals but one has a consequence for the other.

The Minister should be clear on whether all the people who over-priced their services and gave the bad advice will be excluded from receiving money from the trough of €240 million. Will they simply come back again, telling in many cases the usual story that the crisis was caused by international turbulence over which we had no control? Language has slipped away in regard to all these rationalisations of failure, stupidity, laziness, ignorance and arrogance.

See this speech in context