Arthur Morgan (Louth, Sinn Fein)

I thank Deputy Burton for sharing her time with me. I support the Fine Gael motion, which Deputy Fahey described as populist. I wonder why it is popular for people to want to hold these bankers to account. I must be leading a sad life because recently I started to listen carefully to Fianna Fáil speeches, which I regard as dangerous. This evening I thought the Minister of State, Deputy Calleary, was doing particularly well. It was a very technical statement almost devoid of saying anything except what some Garda Commissioner or some other person might have said in the past with very little reference to the Fianna Fáil backroom team. However, he eventually made a bit of a slip when he said: "On the night of 29 September 2008, there simply was too much at stake to discriminate between different types of bondholders and in the end, those whom the Governor felt should not have been included accounted for just 3% of the covered liabilities." So the Minister of State believes it is not a big deal at all even though that 3% amounts to €5 billion. However, on 7 December the Government will rip off the people of this State to the tune of €5 billion in what will probably be the worst budget ever. While it apparently has to be done for the greater good, the Government regards the 3% as pocket change and we should not be excited about such a meaningless amount. However, if it had done its homework properly on 29 September 2008 and shared honestly with this House what the situation really was, then the State would be €5 billion richer, but that is not the case because of gross incompetence on the part of the Government.

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