Michael Collins (Cork South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment published the general scheme of what has become the Companies (Corporate Enforcement Authority) Bill on 4 December 2018. This measure was proposed by the Government in November 2017, as part of a series of measures intended to address white collar crime. The principle measure to be addressed in the Bill is the establishment of a new corporate enforcement authority as an independent company law compliance and enforcement agency. This body will replace the ODCE, which currently supervises, regulates and enforces compliance with company law. The intention behind the new agency is to ensure that suitably qualified experts in accountancy, information technology and corporate enforcement will be available to investigate and respond to complex breaches of company law.

This whole affair adds to public scepticism about how the fallout from the banking collapse was handled. Only three bankers went to jail for fraudulently moving funds between Anglo Irish Bank and Irish Life & Permanent in order to make the former's books look better. Ironically, their crime was in trying to cover over cracks in the financial system as the house of cards started to tumble. Nobody has been held to account for the massive orgy of bank lending which sowed the seeds of the crisis in the first place and led to huge enrichment for senior bankers along the way. Most of the senior bankers, regulators and politicians of the time have retired and are on big pensions. There was no big gap in Irish law which allowed the banking crisis to happen. The Central Bank of Ireland’s powers have since been beefed up, for sure. However, even back when the bubble inflated, it had the legal firepower to at least limit the damage. Also, as a 2016 report of the Law Reform Commission into the regulation and corporate law pointed out, since 1992, it has been an offence for a bank or building society to fail to manage its business in accordance with sound administrative and accounting principles.

The question I would ask is: who paid for this mess? It was we, the taxpayers, who paid. Nobody, but nobody, was held accountable. Will this legislation make people accountable? It is hard to think that it will, because it seems that in this country, the bigger you are, the better the cover-up and the better the pet on the back for doing wrong. Banks in this country are closing their doors to people. These are the very people who bailed out the banks when they had a lot of corrupt goings-on in their businesses. They were found out in this regard but little or nothing was done about it. That did not stop the banks from punishing the people once they got over that bit of a hump and a blind eye was turned to what they were doing.

Banks in my own part of west Cork have been closed, such as AIB in Schull. The Bank of Ireland branches in Dunmanway and Bantry are up for closure in the next number of weeks and no one in government has batted an eyelid. The Minister's colleagues are shouting foul, but they are in government. If ye cannot turn this around, I do not know who in the name of God can. The banks were in a position to dictate the way they ran their businesses in the past. They could dictate how easy it was for them to get away with running their shoddy businesses. They continue to do the latter in different ways and are still unaccountable.

Deputies Mattie McGrath, Carol Nolan and myself took part in a sit-in at KBC Bank in December 2018. Our intention was not to leave the premises until the bank started talking to its customers and stopped treating him like they were some kind of wild animals. They were human beings who had maybe got into a little of debt. I would always support someone who is in a bit of debt and trying their best to come out of it. Instead, the bank rammed the vulture funds down on top of their backs, swept them out, got their bodyguards down from all over Northern Ireland, ran into their farms and ran them out of their houses. Good God almighty; that type of behaviour dates back a couple of hundred years. Again, there is little or nothing in this legislation to make sure that something like that can never happen again. People fought hard to purchase a bit of land. They do fall on difficult times. There is probably no one in the country who can avoid that situation. However, a bank like KBC was unscrupulous in its business and was found out to be doing that. Unfortunately, it is now walking away from the Irish market and it could not care less. Nobody cares. Nobody has power over the banks. They are a law onto themselves. Of course, they will come back to us if they need a bailout. If they are doing something wrong - whether it is one bank or another - we can see how they all can get away with it. People find themselves in desperate, sad and difficult situations as a result.

The saddest thing of all - I know that this is slightly away from the issue - is that we are not supporting the credit unions in the way we should be, particularly as they are not the ones who causing difficulties with our laws or in various situations. The Government will not assist credit unions to loan out money to farmers and businesspeople, or to give a small mortgages to people who want to start off in their lives. They are being refused by regulation in this State. I met with the credit unions in West Cork. They have great branches in Dunmanway and Bantry, places from which Bank of Ireland is walking away, Schull, from which AIB walked away, Clonakilty, Skibbereen, Bandon, Castletownbere and elsewhere. They have great branches. The people who run them know everybody and they respect everybody. Thanks be to God, we do not see them involved in any of the kinds of scandals to which I refer.

We have to bring forward legislation to stop the corruption and the carry-on that went on from happening again. The sad thing is that credit unions are not getting assistance from the State. The legislation being looked at that moment needs to be dealt with immediately in order to free up the credit unions to do a bit of business for people, because we are running out of banks and the banks are running away from us. They have had it with the Irish market. They have cleaned us out fairly well. The State backed them up to the hilt. It is now time for us to put our foot down and support the Irish businessman and the Irish farmer.

The laws and regulatory powers were all there before. The problem was that by the time anyone realised that the banks were in a mess, it was way too late. Just as the system failed to stop the crash, its response afterwards has been found wanting.

A key mistake was made early on by not applying to send a High Court inspector into Anglo Irish Bank and Irish Nationwide. This would have at least provided some clarity on what happened. Instead, we have an interminable legal process based on specific charges with decidedly mixed conclusions. In turn, that has put other investigations on hold, for example, an inquiry by the chartered accountants' regulatory body into specific issues relating to EY's audit of Anglo has been on hold for some years on the request of the Director of Public Prosecutions, DPP, who did not want it to affect other legal proceedings. Other inquiries into the crisis, such as the one under taken by an Oireachtas special committee, have had to tip over issues around issues which crossed over legal cases under way or planned. Our legal process is slow at the best of times but the huge legal teams employed by all sides seem to delay the cases relating to the banking collapse interminably. There is something still in the investigation and prosecution of alleged white-collar crime that is not working. The Law Reform Commission suggested some ways to improve regulation and the legal structure and the penalties for offending have been increased, notably in 2014 legislation, but the key issues seem to lie in the investigation into the allegations of white-collar crime, and when evidence is gathered and the legal process used thereafter. There are endless hurdles, even before a jury gets to hear a case. Rightly or wrongly, this gives the impression that alleged white-collar offences are simply not treated the same as what might be called more traditional offences. That is the fact. That, unfortunately, is the situation that Irish people find themselves in. The good people of west Cork, my constituents, tell me that, sadly, corruption is applauded and has been applauded in this country many times. People who have been found to do wrong have never been made fully accountable. They have been patted on the back all along by the political system, as well as the banking system. They have been given plenty beautiful pensions and they can play golf while those people whose businesses have been ruined from trying to pay off debts caused by the bankers' carry-on have been left high and dry. They do not believe in the legal system there at present. I hope this Bill will do something to turn this around but when ordinary people on the ground talk to me, they are not at all impressed by what they have seen down the years. Now, as I said, we have seen the walk away of banks again. Not alone did they run away with money before but now they are walking away and leaving people under further stress and pressure and sadly, are aided and abetted by the political system. When the banks go under, we, the people of Ireland, must be there to make sure that they are propped up and that the State will back them. When they walk away, the State has no say in the matter. It is a decision made by the bank and the people are left there hanging.

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