Fidelma Healy Eames (Fine Gael)

What we need is a vision and a solution and I do not see either. I see just one prong of a solution, that is, the banking solution. If we look at what has been advised, we will see that we need solutions on the banking front, the fiscal and budget deficit front, the economic front in terms of jobs and competitiveness, on a reputational front and with regard to the social crisis. On the jobs front, the main people the Taoiseach and the Cabinet are letting down are the 435,000 out of work in terms of the social impact.

I mentioned on the Order of Business that I had met three young graduates in one house alone last week who were looking for passport application forms. Where does their future lie? The Government is giving everything to the banks, but the Taoiseach now has an opportunity to show what he can do. He can never be any higher in his leadership role, yet he is not addressing this problem. Everything has gone one way in this country, that is, towards the banks. When we asked the Minister for Finance, Deputy Brian Lenihan, to intervene on behalf of the home owner, he said his only role was to regulate. That is some indictment of the Taoiseach because we now know from the Honohan report and the other banking report that the Taoiseach, when Minister for Finance, did not regulate He has shown no capacity in this area. There have been no deals or write-downs for home owners in negative equity. NAMA will provide for a 43% write-down on properties, while the taxpayer picks up the tab for uncollected developers' debts, for which the Taoiseach has not unequivocally apologised. Neither has he faced the people in a state of the nation address to seek their support. He must apologise unequivocally for the role he played in this problem when Minister for Finance.

The Taoiseach is to be condemned on several grounds for decisions made when he was Minister for Finance. He relied completely on unstable tax returns from stamp duty and capital gains tax during the property boom, a fact well documented in both banking reports. He let us down on the issue of wage competitiveness. During the boom years employees negotiated supplementary wage increases which meant a deterioration in wage competitiveness. The Taoiseach also negotiated benchmarking increases without securing increases in productivity in return.

There were also failures in banking regulation. What the Government has done with Anglo Irish Bank has proved this was a unique home-grown crisis. Under his watch when Minister for Finance, the Taoiseach let the Financial Regulator, Mr. Neary, allow Anglo Irish to become the model for all other banks.