Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

Their time is going to be taken up dealing with these various three stages now rather than having them conducted in public. The Taoiseach has given us no explanation as to why this should be done in private rather than in public. He has cited the precedent of the commissions of investigation leading to the Ryan report and the Murphy report. Those were appropriate commissions of investigation dealing with sensitive matters involving individuals. That is what the commissions of investigation legislation was about; for example, if somebody was assaulted or injured in a Garda station, that is the type of issue that could be investigated by a commission of investigation.

This is public business. This is business that affects every single taxpayer in the country, people who will have to pay for years to come for the failings that happened in the banking system. The public are entitled to have this inquiry conducted in public so they can draw their own conclusions and see it carried out as a public exercise.

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