Dan Boyle (Green Party)

The Bill before us today is necessary in a number of respects. It gives us an opportunity to consider the importance of the financial services industry in this country and the need to assist its development. The primary purpose of this Bill is to enforce the EU markets in financial instruments directive. However, the way in which this Bill has been presented in this and in the other House has been far from ideal. It was published in April but its progress was interrupted by the general election, the formation of a Government, the summer recess and the delay in setting up the Oireachtas committees. As a result of this, we have before us something rarely used by this House, a motion for earlier signature, which is required to comply with the 1 November deadline of the directive. This is something we should try to avoid as much as possible despite the fact that the directive has been allowed to take early effect via statutory instrument.

Another area in which the Bill is not ideal is the inclusion of miscellaneous provisions. Especially in the area of finance we should try to avoid miscellaneous provisions Bills which come across as hotchpotch legislation. The difficulty is that there are small areas of legislation that need to be tuned and some of the provisions help us to fulfil our statutory obligations in terms of other European directives, particularly those on reinsurance and the recognition of contractual netting. However, the overall combination of miscellaneous items in this Bill negates the main purpose of it, which is the implementation of MiFID. There is also the question of why the miscellaneous provisions are being implemented by use of the earlier signature motion, which again is something we should always try to avoid in legislation.

Many of the miscellaneous provisions are to be welcomed. I have already referred to the other EU directives that are being given statutory recognition. Section 11 contains a provision that acts on a recommendation of the Morrogh working group. Members may be aware that this review group was established on foot of the collapse of a firm of stockbrokers in Cork. We are still dealing with the consequences of this occurrence and there are many lessons to be learned from this and from the actions of other investment firms.

Bills such as this run counter to good practice as exemplified by the Department of Finance itself. The Department has put much good work into consolidation legislation, especially in the area of taxes, and particularly in an area as important as financial services we should strive to produce a consolidation Act instead of introducing measures by way of a miscellaneous provisions Bill. I hope that once this legislation reaches the Statute Book, the Department's next step will be to bring the various legislation together.

Section 12 relates to the remaining tragedy that is the Insurance Corporation of Ireland. It is somewhat pathetic that it is a matter with which we still must deal in legislation so many years later. It certainly was a lesson that was badly learnt in public life here.

I welcome the provisions related to the Financial Regulator and the Financial Services Ombudsman. In terms of logic, they give a greater sense of what is being attempted through the directive.

Sections 14 and 15 give important powers to the National Treasury Management Agency, but I want to put on record another concern of mine. The National Treasury Management Agency now not only is responsible for dealing with the national debt, has a supervisory role in the National Pensions Reserve Fund and the State Claims Agency and the review of value for money in public private partnerships, and has a role in overseeing the Post Office Bank fund, in this Bill it is being given another power in terms of foreign exchange and an extension of its role in the Post Office Bank. The latter power is a useful one in that it allows that bank to be a lender of first resort which gives an opportunity in terms of State infrastructure to put in place something for which my party has always argued, that is, the idea of public-public partnerships in the development of infrastructure.

I must admit that I am at a loss as to why section 16 on ministerial pensions is included in this Bill. Perhaps it is a matter that needs to be tidied up but it has no relationship to markets in financial instruments and it does not help the type of legislation we must enact in this area. I have no difficulty with the concept of it being put on the Statute Book. It just should not be done in this legislation. There has been other legislation in which this could have been done more readily.

The Bill includes a number of good amendments to credit union legislation, tidying up the regulations on lending and allowing credit unions, subject to the advice of their own regulator, to lend more freely more of their own assets. The second matter has been a constant complaint from the credit union movement and this will allow credit unions to be more effective, especially in terms of social finance which is their real remit.

However, the Credit Union Act is now ten years old and there are many other issues that need to be dealt with in terms of renewing and reforming the credit union movement and its governing legislation. The time is now right, rather than having specific provisions in a miscellaneous provisions Bill, to introduce a new credit union Bill to update that legislation and I would ask that such would be considered.

Much of this Bill reminds me of the song with the line about the hip bone being connected to the thigh bone in that one connection seems to lead to another. Several of the provisions here relate to insurance. Section 19, which was mentioned already, relates to issues which are current in the international economy dealing with sub-prime mortgages in particular. Here I would probably contradict myself. There is a need for legislation to be proactive in this area. It needs to be immediate and it needs to address the ongoing concerns. I accept the need for the Minister to make amendments in this area and to address the real existing concerns. We do not want an occurrence in this country like that in the United States where such mortgage providers and lending institutions have tended to create a chimera of what appears to be an easy way of dealing with financial difficulties for people in quite severe household income difficulties when in fact it makes the matter worse.

Unfortunately, we are seeing advertised in this country a plethora of these organisations giving the impression that there is an instant solution to people's financial problems, that with one loan a person can consolidate all his or her loans and, suddenly, his or her problems are gone. The reality is people end up paying more for the same debt. The Irish Financial Services Regulatory Authority has a particular role to ensure the myths being portrayed through this advertising and people seeking to trade in this area are given as little licence as possible. I fear for the consequences if that does not happen.

The Bill includes two provisions related to Ordnance Survey Ireland. One is a welcome one related to freedom of information and the other is related to transfer of oversight. Ordnance Survey Ireland is a responsibility of the Tánaiste and Minister for Finance and, obviously, legislative provisions must be made to overcome these particular anomalies where they arise. It is fair to say in the context of this legislation that Ordnance Survey Ireland, as an organisation, tends to get overlooked too often and would probably deserve to be looked at in the context of overriding legislation for itself. It is an organisation that performs a useful role which tends to get ignored, not only by the public but, unfortunately, by most of us involved in policymaking. I hope the reference to it in the legislation might jig a response in terms of how we see Ordnance Survey Ireland as a body in the future.

The last area I want to refer to is the National Pensions Reserve Fund and the provision for tightening up the definition of gross national product. I do not have a difficulty with this in that the definition needs to be given a stronger statutory footing. However, there is a need for an examination of the National Pensions Reserve Fund as it proceeds. We exist at a time where international stock markets, if not in free fall, are certainly in an unhealthy state and the gains that have been made by the National Pensions Reserve Fund in recent years are in danger of withering away unless we look at the policy and the investment priorities. I have constantly called for ethical investment to be part of those policies, as is the case in the Norwegian state pension fund, and we should have such a debate and re-examine the legislation. We must accept that the National Pensions Reserve Fund has been a success and provides us with a bit of security in terms of future pension provision, although it will not go anywhere close to meeting pension needs in future years. The fact that the fund exists and needs to be enhanced and protected should be of concern to this House and should be the subject of renewing legislation.

I welcome the Bill, subject to the provisions I outlined. I hope we will revisit this and put this legislation in a proper context in future legislation.