Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)

It is said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. I am sure the Taoiseach's homage to the US President was appreciated, albeit with nothing like the utter gratitude of Fianna Fáil for the Government's pursuit of its policy agenda. I am more interested in what the Taoiseach might have told President Obama about his attitude to burning senior bondholders. I pursued the Taoiseach this morning on the matter of burden sharing. He referred consistently to "subordinated bondholders", but what about senior bondholders? I mentioned this morning that senior, unsecured and unguaranteed bondholders in Anglo Irish Bank were paid in full last week for a €200 million bond. How can he defend that? The bonds in question were unguaranteed and unsecured. Given the circumstances we are in, why in the name of any kind of logic or decency is the Government allowing that debt to be met? What did the Taoiseach tell the US President? I hope it was not the same message he gave the diplomatic corps and staff and the world at large, which was that the world is all right with Ireland and we will meet all of these debts. That is not acceptable.

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