Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I intend to articulate to the other 26 leaders the necessity of implementing the decision of 29 June. That means we must make progress on setting up the banking union with the supervisory role because the banks cannot be recapitalised directly until that happens. Our starting point is the decision that has been made and the fact that the ESM has had its first board meeting and the Commission has set out its proposals for banking union. So for this to become a reality, that banking union must be put in place. As I said earlier, there are arguments about whether it should be put in place for the 6,000 banks or as a starting point with major banks, which are obviously smaller in number. There are different views about this. I spoke to the Prime Minister of Italy, Mario Monti, the Prime Minister of Portugal, Mariano Rajoy, and the Greek Prime Minister, Antonis Samaras, who all have different views about when it should be implemented and the scope it should have at the beginning. That is a matter for discussion. That is the strategy we want to follow through and there have been a great deal of discussions at official level before getting to that point. I expect the leaders to reflect on what decisions can be taken on Thursday and Friday as a result of the work that has taken place since June in preparing for that to become a reality. Clearly, it is only then that we can determine what the benefit will be for Ireland, which we want to be the maximum amount possible.

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