Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)

In his earlier reply, the Minister said that I said this is not bank resolution legislation. I did not say that - I said it is not like "the bank resolution legislation that has been put in place in other jurisdictions". A number of aspects of that have been dealt with. One of them, of course, is the resort to the courts. That is not normally the provision in a bank resolution Act. Normally the role of the Central Bank is central. It is curious here, and the Minister should explain why he has gone down this road rather than adopting the role of the provisional supervisor. One cannot ask a Fianna Fáil colleague in the House where the nearest ATM is, without him or her telling you, "Did you see that we appointed Dr. Patrick Honohan, and that was a stroke of genius by the Minister?".

When the Bank of Ireland ran into problems here last week with its technical hitch, I asked a Fianna Fáil colleague what was happening in the bank and he said, "Wasn't Lenihan a genius, appointing Dr. Patrick Honohan?" and we had another big discussion regarding how inspired the Minister's appointment was. Now we have appointed him and for some reason the Minister decides to bypass him here.

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