Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

The Taoiseach should leave aside for today the question of who is right and wrong. There will be bank inquiries and so on and there probably will be debates about banks in this House for a long time to come. The chief executive of Anglo Irish Bank came before an Oireachtas committee last week and stated in very simple and stark terms that the lion's share of the €22,000 million of taxpayers' money that has gone into Anglo Irish bank will, as he put it, never be seen again. Deputy Cowen is the Taoiseach and in common with people throughout the country, I want to know whether that man is right. Is our money gone? Is the €22,000 million that has gone into Anglo Irish Bank lost and gone forever? The Taoiseach should not give me arguments or points on which he was right and where I was wrong or where Deputy Kenny was wrong and where everyone else, apart from himself, was wrong. He should simply answer the question, is the money gone?

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