Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)

They are commitments made by a dysfunctional bank, which was not properly regulated and which was encouraged in its folly. The guarantee we offered in 2008 will expire next September and, therefore, we offered bondholders a temporary guarantee while the banks got their affairs in order. It is simply wrong for Ministers to come into the House and pretend the taxpayer has an obligation to pay off all that money.

I want to nail another myth peddled by Government spokesmen, which is that this is a paper transaction that does not involve real money - it is ECB money or Monopoly money or soft money - and it is not part of our debt. It is no such thing. It is hard cash that our grandchildren will be obliged to pay. It is not cheap money. It is being borrowed at a short-term rate, which is the same as, if not greater than, the rate at which the Government is able to borrow. We hear this time and again, as if the additional €64 billion we are putting in today is soft money. This is real hard cash and we have to get that into our heads. The decisions we take later will reduce our capacity to do many things to which our people rightly aspire. Now is the time to be clear about what it is we the taxpayers want from the banking system and what we are willing to pay for. We want a good banking system capable of lending. We want banks of systemic importance to the economy to emerge from the crisis cleansed of their toxic loans. The Minister did not answer the question of why Anglo Irish Bank is regarded as being of systemic importance to this country.

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