Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

He also confirmed that were any bank allowed to go down, we would have had a meltdown in the banking system within days or weeks. That would have been the consequence had we adopted Labour Party policy at the time. Labour Party policy now seems to suggest that the issue was really the extent of the guarantee. That was not the Labour Party position at the time. The Labour Party seems to be trying to reinvent itself on that, just as the Deputy was trying to reinvent himself in trying to remember what party he joined when he left UCG. He could not remember whether it was Sinn Féin The Workers Party or the Workers Party.

The point is that Labour Party policy on the banking issue was wrong. It would have brought about a meltdown of the financial system, a nuclear winter in this country and hundreds and thousands of jobs would have been lost.

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