Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)

This subject is very relevant, especially in view of topical issue raised by Deputy Catherine Murphy. It is a very important issue.

While the Minister is doing his best, the policy of having two pillar banks, which was also the policy of the previous Government, is absurd. While we must save the banks and have functioning banks, having only two strikes a blow against competition. We know now it is a fallacy. I am not saying the Minister for Finance or the Minister of State at the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Deputy Sherlock, is giving us spin but I contend the banks are lying through their teeth. They lie in every survey and lied to the previous and current Ministers for Finance, and they are getting away with it.

The Competition Authority's mission statement claims its brief is to ensure that competition works well for consumers and the Irish economy. Nothing could be further from the truth. The Competition Authority was set up in 1991. There have been resignations of former chairpersons and comments by other chairpersons. The authority had been an abject failure and it has stood idly by. If it has board members, why do they not offer their resignation? The authority is toothless. I do not make these comments because finances are scarce but because, during the Celtic tiger years when there was plenty of money, it did nothing. With the compliance of the previous Government, of which I was a member, it allowed big cartels to take over everything and put out of business the very people Deputy Catherine Murphy was speaking about, the small businesspeople who represent the backbone of the economy. They have been wiped out, hoovered up, closed down and cast to the winds. This is unbelievable and is the practice in a huge array of sectors, including the agriculture and cement industries and all industries in between.

In every town, including Clonmel, big businesses have been encouraged to set up on the outskirts and have got preferential rate deals. They have squeezed the commercial lifeblood from the towns, and squeezed it from the hard-working ratepayers, including the Minister of State at the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Deputy Perry, who are involved in many businesses. These ratepayers have been in towns for generations, three in some cases, but have been destroyed. Our following of the aforementioned pattern ten years after America, England, France and elsewhere is ludicrous.

The Minister for Finance referred to codes of practice introduced by the banks, but these are a joke. The Competition Authority cannot ensure competition and – I hate saying this in the House – one might as well bring in paper from the toilets as codes of practice because they are ignored by the greedy people who got us into this mess. Why would they not ignore them when the Government, following the example of its predecessor, paid a promissory note of €700 million only last week? They are laughing all the way to the bank – pardon the pun – and laughing at us. The ordinary taxpayer and small businessperson are crucified. We must keep some of the hard-earned taxpayers' money, but not to bail out the speculators, gamblers, bankers and others whom the Government said it would burn. I stated last night the Government was to have a fire hotter than hell's fire in order to burn so many of them. It has not burnt any of them; it just followed blindly the path of the previous Government, which represents an abject failure. When we consider what occurred in Greece and what is happening in Italy, we realise there is hope that we may change our ways. We are being forced to change our way.

I referred to the big conglomerates. The county council in south Tipperary gave planning permission for a Tesco store in Cahir and it was upheld by An Bord Pleanála. It was going to close the premises of a businessman across the road and put in a facilitatory new roundabout. The businessman was told by the council to talk to Tesco on the grounds that it might buy him out. Is that what we want? The businessman was a self-employed young man, younger than I am, employing 14 people. Stores such as Tesco export all their money and invest nothing in the community. Although they create a few jobs, we lose twice as many in other sectors. They have got away with murder because of "hello money" and everything else.

If we have only two pillar banks, they know they will be able to mop up and threaten the people about whom Deputy Catherine Murphy talks. The code of practice limiting the number of telephone calls or business transactions is baloney. One is living in fear of the banks. The dirty look on a manager's face when one enters a bank is telling because it demonstrates banks do not want the aforementioned businesses anymore because they know they will be bailed out by successive Governments. Why would they care? They do not care. Codes of practice are a waste of time. I want to focus on the operations of CRH. It was fined €28 million by the Polish Government. It only expanded its operations there since this economy subsided. It has brought down many a small business in my constituency. I cite the Tarrant brothers which was tremendous family owned business that gave valuable employment and a wonderful service to the ordinary people, including me and my colleague, Deputy Tom Hayes, who lives closer to it than I do. That company gave credit, it knew the people and looked after them. Roadstone came in and blew it out of the water with unfair competitive practices while the Competition Authority sat idly by. I do not know what we pay its members or why we have that authority as it is a pure waste. It has been set up since 1990 and it should be suspended forthwith because it is not doing its job. It has been an abject failure. It has been said by more eminent people than me that the Competition Authority in its negligence has had as detrimental effect on our economy as have the bankers who brought us to our knees. The authority has sat idly by. Previous Regulators did nothing to regulate the financial services industry. They sat idly by and were rewarded. The Competition Authority has done the same in regard to business practices. What Roadstone has done to small companies around the country is a disgrace.

Cemex is another company in my constituency and I have received e-mails from concerned groupings about it. That company was taken over recently and all the workers have been tossed to the wind. The practices in which CRH engage will result in similar companies having to close. The practices they employ are a smokescreen to close companies in order that CRH can continue its monopoly. That is happening on a daily basis before our eyes. We need to wake up and smell the coffee. Why do we have the Competition Authority and codes of practices? They are nothing more than smokescreens. People have been paid to draw up such codes of practice.

I wish I had more time to speak but I appreciate the Chair's forbearance. CRH is one of the companies that must be dealt a blow and stopped in its tracks. Our economy is being swallowed up by the greed of the bankers. Business people who are trying their best in spite of the bankers are being subsumed, attacked, taken over and being literally evicted from their rightful businesses even though they have paid rates and taxes. The Minister of State, Deputy Perry, understands what I am talking about. I know his background in business. This Bill is some effort in this respect but it only tinkers with the real problem.

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