Ivana Bacik (Independent)

I echo calls from other Senators for a debate on banking. I stated that the country is crying out for a national recovery plan, but it is also crying out for accountability from the top bankers. There have been calls across both sides of this House for better regulation, but we have a regulation system and recent legislation to deal with all this. For example, we created the Office of Director of Corporate Enforcement in 2001, the Irish Financial Services Regulatory Authority in 2003, and the Market Abuse Regulations in 2005. As a criminal lawyer, I can say that there are criminal offences in the Criminal Justice (Theft and Fraud Offences) Act 2001 which are applicable to the sort of things we are seeing at the top levels of the banks today. The problem is not with the lack of legislation, but with the lack of enforcement, with a culture where non-compliance was tolerated for far too long, and where the Garda fraud squad has been afraid to investigate because it has not been given any sense that this would be a good thing to do. We need to have a debate on the enforcement of existing laws, so that we see a situation like that which occurred in America, where bankers in Enron were indicted on charges of conspiracy, a basic charge known to our criminal law.

When is the Immigration, Residence and Protection Bill likely to come to the House? I have been asked by many people for whom this is a matter of great concern, and it would be useful for us to know that.