Results 23,661-23,680 of 35,893 for speaker:Pearse Doherty

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: Okay.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: Mr. Ahern, I only asked you one question and the question ... I gave you two quotes just to show a trend in this here and I asked you one question, I says your statement talks about being able to interact, to listen, to respond to views, proposals and criticism. Could it not be a fair person's viewpoint that this wasn't just you being positive but you were actually trying to close down...

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: No. Okay.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: Okay. Mr. Ahern, in 2007 and 2008 there was a number of things happening. We know from 2007, the Government was investigating possible responses to the emerging credit crisis. At the same time, both commercial and residential properties had stalled. In March 2008, INBS was frozen out of the wholesale markets with no access to normal ECB funding. In March 2008, Seánie FitzPatrick was...

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: There's a very influential journalist who writes for the Financial Times... and you mentioned about St. Patrick's Day. He was telling people not to ... to move away from the likes of Anglo at that time because of over-exposure to the property market. Were you completely unaware of the banks' over-exposure to the property market, given the fact that you believed that it was only a liquidity...

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: I didn't ask that question, Mr. Ahern, just to clarify-----

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: -----I asked you ... I asked you did you believe that the economy was sound, given the fact that guarantee legislation was being drafted before you left the Office of the Taoiseach, given that certain banks were shut out of the market and the over-exposure of major banks in this country to the property market?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: Go raibh mhaith agat. Mr. Ahern, you said ... you were critical of the Financial Regulator and you also said that you'd be damned to take responsibility for something that wasn't your responsibility. And it's been put to you by Deputy Higgins that you sponsored or were aware or promoted light-touch regulation. Given that statement, how can you wash your hands of, or how can you not take...

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: Mr. Ahern, you travelled to America in 2007, on 14 March ... at a breakfast meeting with the Financial Services Industry, over in New York. And at that, you were accompanied by the Financial Regulator, and in your address to them, you say, "International benchmarking studies show that Ireland is very lightly regulated compared to most of our European colleagues." You were telling the...

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: In your own words you were advocating that Ireland was a light touch, sorry, "very lightly regulated compared to most of our European colleagues and the burden on business of regulation tended to be lower than in many other EU member states." So do you accept that you were aware that the Financial Regulator who accompanied you there was pursuing light-touch regulation with the banks? And if...

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: Sorry you put it.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: I'm only quoting you Mr. Ahern; they are not my words.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: I'll move along anyway. If I can ask you, we've seen the graphs in terms of the explosion of credit into the market. And you yourself talked about that the commercial property was where the madness really took place. Mr. Ahern, your Government introduced the Asset Covered Securities (Amendment) Act 2007. It's reported that you were lobbied by the financial institutions, and the Minister...

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: Mr. Ahern, you were the Taoiseach of the country-----

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: -----doesn't all legislation have to be ... get a Cabinet approval?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: Okay so, do you accept collective responsibility?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: Were you aware that this allowed for banks like Anglo Irish Bank which was a commercial ... in the main, commercial property bank, to actually secure more funding from the wholesale markets to release into the Irish and other markets? Were you aware that that ... you were lobbied by the financial sector. Were you aware that this was the intent behind this legislation, as a former Minister...

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: But whether it did or not-----

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (16 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: This is finally, whether it did or not, the Government's intention, through this legislation, to allow for commercial mortgages to be included in covered assets securities, was to allow for banks such as Anglo, Bank of Ireland, Depfa bank, banks who all got into trouble, to access more wholesale money on the wholesale markets at the peak of credit into the Irish market. Do you take...

Written Answers — Department of Finance: Financial Services Ombudsman (15 Jul 2015)

Pearse Doherty: 71. To ask the Minister for Finance the number of customers at Permanent TSB who were wrongly moved from, or prevented from being on, a tracker mortgage, and who have had their case dealt with by the bank; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [29266/15]