Results 6,341-6,360 of 7,975 for speaker:Joe Higgins
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: Why did everyone get it so wrong? They didn't, Mr. Gleeson ...this is the point I would put to you. For example, were the critiques, very perceptive of David McWilliams, an economist, ever discussed on the board of Allied Irish Banks when he was predicting that the credit expansion was just going crazy and that it would finish in tears?
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: The witness is talking down the clock, Mr. Chairman.
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: Mr. Gleeson, were the warnings of economists like David McWilliams ever discussed or taken seriously on the board or by yourself?
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: But you had historic precedents from Sweden only a few years before you became chairman. But I need to move on because of time. You put a lot of emphasis, and may I put it to you, Mr. Gleeson, you blame Anglo for a lot of things-----
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: Yes, it's an explanation but you said it was inevitable that we were drawn too much into Anglo's wake. Now, is it really credible that, you know, in Irish banking you had a pied piper called Anglo spinning tunes of excessive credit, profiteering, etc., and that the whole pack-----
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: -----were in thrall and dutifully followed. Is that credible?
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: Because it affects your profits?
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: But mainly, am I correct, it would affect the bank's profits?
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: Mr. Gleeson, are banks not there primarily to make profits?
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: And I haven't time to go through it but I compared your profits to Anglo profits during the bubble and you were massively ahead. How much profit did you need to be satisfied?
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: You said, Mr. Gleeson, at an extraordinary general meeting, again if I may say, spreading responsibility, "We drank too [much] from the national cup of confidence." Would it be more honest to say that you drank too much from the bankers' cup of greed for profits and that was what drove you?
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: Why?
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: Why were you chasing Anglo then?
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: Yes, but I'm speaking to an experienced barrister who is well able to stand up and-----
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: Mr. Gleeson, you spoke about ethical behaviour, and between 1996 and 2006, a PTSB analysis found that each year the price of an average home increased-----
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: -----by the equivalent of the average industrial wage.
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: To 2006.
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: Each year, requiring young working people to have mortgages extended from 20 years' duration to 40 years, into their retirement, and at unsustainable levels. Now, can I ask you, in your view, is it moral or ethical, do you think, that inordinate profiteering and speculation in building land and in housing by banks, developers and bondholders should enslave a generation of young working...
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: Yes ... and I'm-----
- Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (23 Apr 2015)
Joe Higgins: Mr. Gleeson-----