Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

That will probably not act as a great inhibitor for disclosing information that might otherwise be protected by a confidentiality clause but, critically, it is legally necessary for the banking inquiry to be able to access all the information it might want to access to get to the bottom of the banking crisis in terms of why it happened, who was at fault, the systems failures and so on. For those reasons, one would support it.

The only issues worth discussing in the context of this Bill are those that arise from it, which I find interesting, and that occurred to me in the context of the departmental briefing, that is, why are some categories of information within the Central Bank subject to a confidentiality clause and, in some cases, criminal sanction if that information gets out? That is an interesting question against the background of a banking crisis which was caused by a nexus of relationships involving developers, banks, politicians, the Central Bank and regulators both at a national and a European level. All those people had some involvement in the nexus of relationships, or what some of us might call the golden circle or the elite. They decided what happened and they oversaw the banking and policy regimes that produced this catastrophic economic crisis that has had such devastating consequences for millions of our citizens, who are still paying for the mistakes, and possibly the wrongdoing, that produced that crisis.

That begs the interesting question about transparency and why we need confidentiality when it comes to information that can have such devastating consequences for citizens who will never be able to access that information but who are the victims of decisions that were made behind those confidential barriers. One manifestation of all of that is the refusal of representatives of the European Central Bank to come before the banking inquiry. They say they are not allowed to do that and that they are only accountable to certain people. It is because of the European Central Bank that we are subject to certain confidentiality clauses in the first place in terms of information we can access from our own Central Bank.

Why is any of this information confidential at all? I appreciate that there might be categories of information held by the Central Bank that should be confidential. For example, I do not see any particular reason the deposits of ordinary deposit holders should be public information that can just be thrown out willy-nilly. I agree that private and personal information on loans that are given to ordinary bank customers of banks for house extensions, cars or holidays should be subject to confidentiality. The customers of the banks should expect such confidentiality. However, the banking inquiry will be looking at some very different categories of loans, including the reckless commercial loans that were given to a relatively small number of big developers. The activities of such people, who were driven by the profit motive, commercial interests and the desire to accumulate personal wealth, bankrupted the country and cost us so dearly. I suggest not only that the banking inquiry should have access to such information, but also that everybody should be able to access it.

I would like to know a little bit more in this regard. I do not know the extent to which the Minister of State can illuminate these areas for us. What categories of information will be covered by this measure? When I was discussing with the departmental officials the sorts of categories with which there might be problems, they gave a good example. It might be interesting to know the top ten, top 50 or top 100 big commercial property exposures of the big banks that wrecked the economy and went bad. Frankly, I think we are entitled to know that information. I am not sure whether we are being given such an entitlement, however. Could people be subject to a penalty if they disclose this sort of information in the Dáil? I would like to know about the hundreds of millions in loans that were given out to a golden circle. It is clear that normal prudential lending practices, such as proper risk assessment, were not adhered to. On what basis were these loans given out? Who was giving them out? Did people give loans to massive developers over and over again on a nod and a wink basis because they were mates, were part of the same golf clubs or had the same political connections? The public is entitled to ask for such information. I wonder about the confidentiality and secrecy rules that might prevent information we have every right to know from getting into the public domain.

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