Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)

I know what the Senator is saying. There is no easy way through this and no button we can press to avail of it but I am conscious of what the Senator has said. Issues arise from it.

The report of the interdepartmental group on impaired mortgages will be published next week and we will debate it in both Houses. We will see what comes of it. The idea is that it is not a report to be put on the shelf. As soon as we debate it in the Houses we will try to put a timeline on implementation and move from an interdepartmental group to an implementation group so we are not merely entertaining ourselves by debating it. A real need exists and we must get on with it, particularly with regard to new solvency and new bankruptcy legislation because this is the key starting position. It must be a priority.

I will examine what the Senator stated about extraordinarily high legal interest rates of 187% and see whether anything can be done about this. Normally, an interest rate is a measure of risk so a super high interest rate would suggest a super high risk. There is a connection and I do not know what is valid and whether one can limit it. If the amount of interest charged is limited one might eliminate risk and encourage people to borrow wildly without being aware of the risk.

To answer Senator Bacik, the fiscal council is independent. I understand how it will proceed, as it will arrive at its conclusions and publish a report. It is within the competence of the Seanad to decide to debate the published report. It does not have to be tracked through the Department of Finance because it is independent. The Seanad will be free to deal with it as it sees fit.

With regard to the Tobin tax, last week the Commission published its proposals on a financial transaction tax and I assume information on this is available on its website. Our attitude is that if there was a move towards a financial transaction tax it would be better if it was organised by a group such as the G20 and applied worldwide. If it was to be a European tax, it would be very important to Ireland's interests that it applied to the 27 member states and not the 17 eurozone states. I would be very nervous of a transaction tax existing in Dublin but not in London. It is the type of industry that can move with the click of a finger from computer to computer. It can be switched overnight to a new office in London handling what was previously handled in Dublin. This displacement effect must be considered.

There is no agreement in Europe on this. It is the usual story of various countries having differing views. The UK is very much against a transaction tax while France is very much in favour of it and other countries such as Ireland are watching their interests to ensure if it is introduced it will be under the best possible circumstances. Recommendations have also been made on the proceeds. The Commission has recommended it would be a Europe-wide tax for funding the European budget. We have always maintained the position that the European budget should be built up by contributions from the sovereign countries in proportion to their rating. We would not like to move to it being funded by Europe-wide taxation because that is only a couple of steps from tax harmonisation.