Dáil debates

Thursday, 10 April 2014

Electoral (Amendment) (No. 2) Bill 2014: Second Stage (Resumed)

 

12:55 pm

Photo of Mick WallaceMick Wallace (Wexford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Bill. The idea of this House being unavailable to those who have run into financial problems in this climate and in this day and age is a bit on the harsh side. Bankruptcy is very strange. We have had an economic collapse of a sort in Ireland, and some people who have lost hundreds of millions, and some who have cost the State hundreds of millions, will not go bankrupt while some people who have lost money will want to go bankrupt and others who do not want to be bankrupt will go bankrupt.

I checked the code of conduct for Members of the Dáil Éireann a few minutes ago. It states that a conflict of interest exists where a Member participates in or makes a decision in the execution of his or her office knowing that it will improperly and dishonestly further his or her private financial interests or another person's private financial interests directly or indirectly. On such a basis I will not be allowed to vote on the Bill because I am dealing with four different banks and one of them refuses to confirm that it will not bankrupt me. I could be accused of having a vested interest in voting for the Bill, but I do welcome it.

My company owed the VAT man €1.4 million but we could not pay it so we went out of business. We were not allowed to trade, which is fair enough. I did not get quite as well treated by some banks as others did. Independent News and Media, which loves to call me a tax cheat, got a bailout of approximately €138 million from the banks, more than €50 million of which has fallen on the Irish taxpayer, but Mick Wallace is the tax cheat because he owes VAT of €1.4 million which his business could not pay. In our last ten years of trading we paid €15 million. I often wonder what the guys who call me a tax cheat paid in the past ten years but I will probably never get the answer to it.

In the United States, millionaires go bankrupt on average 3.5 times. It is interesting to note that only one in ten millionaires who go broke during a recession ever go bankrupt again. Recessions are very educational and people who get burned goodo learn much from them. These are very interesting statistics.

One sometimes wonders how a guy can lose so much money, but business is strange that way. If houses or apartments are to be built someone must do it, and more often than not a person must borrow money to do so, and so the person is taking a certain risk. Very often the risk works out well and money is made by all concerned. This includes the developer, the builder and the bank.

Before the recession I understood I had a relationship with some of the banks I dealt with and that we were in it together. Generally we used to meet on my terms and got on really well, and they were very glad to be doing business with me. They probably charged me a little above the norm in the interest rates. The fact I did not wear a suit, cut my hair or join a political party probably did not help me in any way.

I used to get money out of them anyway. However, when trouble arrived, I noticed that I was the only one who was wrong. I had been dull enough to borrow serious money, but the idea that the bank had also taken a risk in the project in which we both had been involved was lost. Judgments are given in the commercial courts on a regular basis in which consideration is not given to the fact that the bank also has a liability. It also took a gamble and it would be useful if a rather more rational view was taken in that regard. Those who had borrowed the money became the next thing to criminals, while the banks that had cost taxpayers throughout the world an absolute fortune were the goodies, which was a strange notion. I welcome the Bill which constitutes a sensible move.

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