Clare Daly (Dublin North, United Left) | Oireachtas source

An attempt has been made to say that this is a Northern problem; it is not. Yesterday, we read reports in the newspapers about NAMA bragging about yielding profits of €473 million when we know it realised and acquired these loans at a massive discount in the first place. It handed them over to individuals who flipped them and profited from them at the expense of Irish taxpayers.

The Government might think it has dodged this issue and will vote the motion down, but it has to ask itself what is the rationale for the sale of Project Arrow. The project has a book value of €6.3 billion, but NAMA will not get €1 billion for it although half of the portfolio comprises residential property in the South. The Government has teed up a done deal. The property portfolio will be sold to Cerberus, a US vulture fund, at less than €100,000 per residential unit at a time when the State has a housing crisis. It is treachery of the highest order and the Government has to join the dots. There is no way it can dodge the issue.

There will be a commission of investigation into NAMA. I do not have the confidence that it will be done under this Government, but it will be done. Project Arrow is not the subject of a competitive tender. Project Eagle was not either. We had the mythical Fortress remaining in the bid, but everybody knows when bundles are packaged in huge parcels which only US vulture funds can acquire that is not a competitive process. The Government's failure to deal with this issue will come back to haunt it in a very serious way. The myth that it is any different from the crowd that went before it has been truly blown.

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