Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)

A great deal of it has been finalised but I would like to deal with the question of the shareholding agreement that both Deputy Rabbitte and Deputy O'Donnell raised. As Deputy O'Donnell rightly said, everything depends on the terms of the shareholders' agreement but shareholders' agreements are very common. He gave the private analogy but there are many shareholding agreements where the subscriber takes a 1% shareholding but determines the entire policy of the company. I have seen many shareholding agreements where that has been the case.

It seemed to me that much of Deputy Rabbitte's argument was based on the majority-minority zero sum game. To use a metaphor from our political experience, the shareholding agreement is not unlike the Good Friday Agreement. It can provide a consensual manner in which a company will be managed consistent with the legislation.

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