Results 1,061-1,080 of 4,414 for speaker:Sean Barrett

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: Yes. But you were trying to run a fiscal policy where credit was expanding at 25% a year. Was there not a need to tell the guys in Dame Street, "Hey, we can't continue like this"?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: Yes.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: Because in your introductory remarks, you referred to the "wall of money" coming in and that the downside was the loss of the interest rate as a method of control.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: You did indeed, yes, yes. So, was there any mechanism to deal with your concerns, the wall of money-----

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: -----and the loss of the interest rate?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: But were the design faults there from the beginning?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: I know it's the realm of speculation, but supposing we had at the separate regulator, and supposing we were looking to have a body which has the prestige, which say the IDA has, would that not have helped to say, "Look-----

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: -----this rate of credit expansion and this rate of concentration on construction will end in tears?"

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: Yes, and------

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: It was more or less the model ... rather than the individual. You say on page 7 of your statement, "I cannot recall [reports from the statutory auditors at the banks] ever being discussed in the department."

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: But we know from some of those accounts in June 2008, that they were putting banks as solvent which were into your successor within a matter of months looking for money. So did the accountants play a proper role in this, in retrospect, and as an accountant yourself?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: Yes.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: The last sentence, I think, yes, yes.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: I'm on a time constraint, thank you.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: On the wrap-up question then, well how did so many accountants and central bankers and, indeed, the bankers themselves, land us in so much trouble?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (1 Jul 2015)

Sean Barrett: Thank you. And thank you, Chair.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport and Communications: National Postcode System - Eircode: Loc8 Code Limited (30 Jun 2015)

Sean Barrett: I welcome Mr. Delaney. Like the Chairman, I have listened to all the evidence and I thank Mr. Delaney for the documents he sent us. My concerns about this project grow every time I hear more detail at these meetings. Supposing we do nothing - I know this has been through the tendering process and so on - the taxpayer saves €27 million and An Post continues to deliver 98% of the post...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport and Communications: National Postcode System - Eircode: Loc8 Code Limited (30 Jun 2015)

Sean Barrett: I thank the Chairman. I am indebted to him for what he does. Obviously, the matter has been around the Department since 2006 and we have heard from witness after witness. I do not think anybody who has appeared before the committee would not put €27 million of their own money into this project. What is it supposed to be doing?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport and Communications: National Postcode System - Eircode: Loc8 Code Limited (30 Jun 2015)

Sean Barrett: At the moment, 98% of the post is delivered the next day. Even if this were a perfect system, it would achieve an improvement of only two percentage points, although no organisation operates at 100%. In the context of the Chairman's earlier comment that we all recognised in 2011 that there had to be reform of the way we look at public expenditure, even though one of the referendums did...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport and Communications: National Postcode System - Eircode: Loc8 Code Limited (30 Jun 2015)

Sean Barrett: I think Mr. Carr's people had the numbers with them. An experience I have had, in a constituency which is on both sides of the Border - that of graduates of Trinity College Dublin - is that the Northern Ireland address codes are an extra nuisance. I know where a man lives in Clones, but I will be asking what the seven-digit code for Newtownbutler is, when it is only six or seven miles...