Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

We do know that an incorporeal meeting took place and that a garda knocked on the door. What happened thereafter, I do not know.

Two years after the original guarantee, which we were promised would cost nothing, we are faced with enormous bills, credit is still scarce, and the cost of Government borrowing is soaring. The Labour Party has no confidence in the Government's banking strategy. We stood alone in opposing the original guarantee in September 2008 and we have been more that vindicated by developments since. As I stated on the night on which the guarantee was introduced, we were not disposed to Fianna Fáil being given a blank cheque. The Minister for Finance stated earlier that he wants the guarantee to be extended tonight and that he wants another blank cheque. He also stated that tomorrow he will provide us with a little information about the blank cheque he proposes we sign tonight.

On each occasion the Minister, Deputy Brian Lenihan, or the Taoiseach, Deputy Cowen, have tried to draw a line under the bank losses, they have been found some months later to have completely underestimated the scale of the problem. We were informed that the original guarantee would be the cheapest bank rescue in the world. However, it has already cost Irish taxpayers more than €30 billion and the bill keeps rising. They scoffed last year when the IMF suggested that the total bill could hit €25 billion. That figure has already bee surpassed. All sorts of people were rushed out to inform us that the IMF had it wrong.

We are being asked to extend the guarantee but we are not yet being told what will be the cost of the last blank cheque. The Government is insisting on voting this through but it will not tell us the cost of the bail-outs for Anglo Irish Bank and Irish Nationwide and nor will it outline the position of the two important and major high street retail banks.

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