Joe O'Toole (Independent)

I want to go firmly on the record on this issue. Yesterday the Leader raised the issue of energy costs. He made a fair point and this is an issue that should be considered. The Joint Committee on Communications, Energy and Natural Resources provided an opportunity to discuss this and what we discovered is that the real issue is with the wholesalers, such as Whitegate oil refinery, which supply the wholesale market in Ireland. They determine the prices. Whereas we always consider the price of crude oil when discussing the price of petrol and diesel at the pumps, what we should be looking at is the price of crude oil on the world market in comparison with the wholesale price at which it is being supplied to Irish retailers. I have checked out this issue since it was raised yesterday and have found that it cuts across two committees — the Joint Committee on Communications, Energy and Natural Resources and the Joint Committee on Enterprise, Trade and Employment, which deals with pricing issues. There may be a need to investigate this as a special issue under an ad hoc arrangement. This is something in which many people are interested and we should move forward on it.

A number of comments were made yesterday about the banks. I would like to go back to a comment I made almost three weeks ago in the House. Whatever AIB said yesterday, it confirmed that its capitalisation was as required. There was much debate here previously about whether the banks were properly capitalised. We do not know that and we have not seen the figures. I pointed out previously that the Financial Regulator said they were capitalised. AIB is currently capitalised to the required amount and is deciding it needs further capitalisation, as are the European and US banks. What it got wrong was its forecast three months ago. It is not the case that the banks are more at risk today than they were yesterday. They are not. The first bit of information we have received confirms what the regulator has been saying.