Results 3,181-3,200 of 19,445 for speaker:Brian Cowen

Order of Business (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: I understand we are awaiting publication.

Order of Business (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: Soon.

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: I have noted that for the past while Deputy Kenny, and the Deputy beside him this morning in one of the newspapers, has been trying to personally smear me or suggest I am in some way responsible for the collapse in the banking system.

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: I want to make it clear to Deputy Kenny that I take full responsibility for all my decisions as Minister for Finance - that is the first point. I always did and always will defend the actions of Government in the past.

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: However, the position that is being suggested in regard to a long-standing dinner engagement with Anglo Irish Bank has no relevance at all to this situation.

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: First, as Minister for Finance, I attended such meetings and dinners with other bankers down the years during my time. I want to make it clear that this has no relevance whatever to this situation. The situation Deputy Kenny wants to raise concerning the challenge to liquidity in the banking system, which subsequently turned into a serious problem on 28 September, as we saw, was dealt with...

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: -----and those of the Government. What we were seeking to contend with, as, indeed, was the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank, was an issue regarding liquidity challenges in the Irish system. That was well known and well documented at the time. Therefore, I do not accept for one moment this idea that Brian Cowen is personally responsible for the collapse of the banking system...

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: What has happened in regard to all of these matters is that we sought to deal with these situations on the basis of the best possible advice at the time and at all times. I do not accept the contentions made by Deputy Kenny and I treat them with contempt.

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: It is not that. It is the Deputy's tactics.

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: For heaven's sake.

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: I do.

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: It is not my nature; it is the truth.

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: I will answer this statement by Deputy Kenny. When I became Minister for Finance in 2004, I made my first budget speech for the 2005 budget a couple of months later. I set up a tax strategy group and reviewed all the property reliefs, etc. I used independent consultants, Goodbody and others. The tax strategy group and all those papers are on the website-----

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: I should be allowed to reply without interruption and not have to listen to some of Deputy McCormack's guff. He is the gurrier in chief when it comes to that sort of thing. I will not have my integrity challenged here by Deputy Kenny or the guilt by association he is trying to impute. When I became Minister for Finance in 2004, I set up such a group. Those papers are in the public domain...

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: People are trying to revise history. Right up to the general election of 2007, everyone held the same view of the future prospects of the Irish economy at that time.

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: Let us get the facts clear. In autumn of 2007, we had a major problem with regard to liquidity in the international system. The US Federal Reserve, the European Central Bank and everyone else including the Central Bank of Ireland, were working in the context of trying to ensure we could maintain liquidity in the system. This is all documented for anyone to see. By autumn 2008, when Lehman...

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: There is a debate being carried on in the country and in this House and particularly by Fine Gael, that seeks to suggest this is an issue which originated here, for which we are to blame and for which I am to blame.

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: I want to make a distinction and I will defend my position as Minister for Finance with anyone. I continue to take, as every Government should, full responsibility for its actions at all times but I am not going to take the revised version of history coming from Deputy Kenny who had an even looser fiscal policy framework to put to the Irish people when he sought this job at the last election.

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: When I was Minister for Finance I refused to take some of the options offered by Fine Gael such as the abolition of stamp duty in order to revive the property market. I was the person who refused to take all that advice from Fine Gael which it regarded as an opportunity to win middle class votes in the general election. Those are the facts and I will not take the revisionism that Deputy...

Leaders' Questions (31 Mar 2010)

Brian Cowen: In regard to yesterday's decisions and how they were portrayed, the capital that is being provided by the Government to the banks involves, first, the conversion of preference shareholdings in AIB and Bank of Ireland.