Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

The chief executive of Anglo Irish Bank has indicated to the Oireachtas committee what the situation is, namely, that were one to go for immediate liquidation of the bank, it would involve a cost to the taxpayer of over €42 billion, which has been the policy put forward by Fine Gael on a number of occasions. This would be in addition to an immediate funding requirement of up to €70 billion. Clearly that is not viable. What we seek to achieve is to obtain for the taxpayer the best possible outcome of what has been an appalling situation. The reduction in the value of the loans provided for by NAMA, and the losses on the non-NAMA loan book and, to a limited extent, restructuring of the balance sheet of the bank in the context of a proposed bank split, has meant that additional capital has been required. The issue, ultimately, for Government has always been to discover in what way it can reduce the exposure of the taxpayer over whatever period required for this part of the Anglo Irish Bank operations to be dealt with.

There is a funding requirement, as things stand, of €22 billion. The options that were available for an immediate liquidation were far in excess of that. In the longer term, in the aftermath of this recapitalisation, we will have to consider the question of obtaining some bank levy support for return of moneys to the taxpayer and the Exchequer.

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