Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, went out of his way on the night IBRC was wound down to compliment the board of IBRC. He stated, "I wish to emphasise that the reasons the steps are being taken are entirely distinct from the performance or the direction of the board of management of IBRC." He also stated: "I acknowledge, with much appreciation, the significant efforts the directors and staff have made". This is at odds with some of what I have received under the freedom of information provisions, including an internal memo from the Department which states that it was concerned at the number of very large transactions of over €100 million that were poorly executed under the direction of the then CEO, Mike Aynsley. The memo also states that the performance management in executing these transactions raised the question of the effectiveness of the CEO.

Much of what the Minister of State said I could probably have written myself because of the information I have received through parliamentary questions, which was like pulling hen's teeth, but a whole lot of other questions need to be answered. There were many other very large transactions and we need to know what they were. The people whom the Minister of State and I meet every day, who are struggling and who bailed out the bank, have an entitlement to know they got as much as was possible. It seems that a golden circle is operating and that there are serious conflicts of interest all over the place. I would go so far as to say I believe there needs to be an independent inquiry into this transaction. If it is the case that a company, by virtue of winning that deal, was positioned to go on and win lucrative deals such as a metering contract, as was in the news, to the exclusion of other people who were trade buyers, one must ask why this could have happened. There are very serious questions which undermine democracy, and transparency needs to be the winner in this. I compliment the officials in the Department because from a lot of this I can see that they were really doing their job.

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