Larry Butler (Fianna Fail)

They were very good at robbing the banks all right. When I heard Senator Doherty's contribution, I had to laugh.

NAMA is there to improve our banking system and also to ensure the banks are much more prudent when they start lending again. We need the banks to lend to the greater economy. If we are to see an upturn in the economy by 2011, we will need a good banking system, but it will not be at the same level as existed heretofore. We must get this across to people and we should not mislead them. If we get this across, then we are on the right track to making our economy more viable. It has been declining for the past two or three years.

If the National Asset Management Agency Bill is not before the House next week, then we should have a debate with the unions and others and ask them to understand the situation in which the Government finds itself. There is no use in asking who caused this or that. We are where we are. We should not be playing the blame game at the moment. We need to find out how to get out of the current situation quickly and efficiently. The smart economy document which we produced last year is a key part of the plan to get us out of the current problem. It will create anything up to 30,000 new jobs immediately. There are 5,000 registered contractors in the insulation business owing to the grant system that has been introduced, and they are doing very well. We should move any carbon tax towards the retrofit industry to ensure we develop it. We will also save ourselves a carbon tax from Europe and create jobs. Examples such as these are vital in the creation of the new green collar worker who will take over from here.