Aideen Hayden (Labour) | Oireachtas source

There is a certain sense of déjà vu for many of us in that we were here not so many hours ago debating the emergency legislation to liquidate what was Anglo Irish Bank. Like everybody else, I have been on Twitter and Facebook and have been listening to the social media. I am at something of a loss in reconciling what we did last night with what people are talking about this morning. It is amazing the way the naysayers come out of the woodwork the minute anything positive happens in the country.

Like everybody else, I accept it was not ideal that we had to pass emergency legislation in the way we did, but we all accept, given what we know, that it was necessary. Ideally, that legislation would have been introduced in tandem with the final agreement with the European Central Bank, but that was not to be. We know that discussions are continuing in Frankfurt this morning.

Some of the commentary about how we are mortgaging our children's future and that we should have held out for debt forgiveness makes me wonder what command of economics some of the commentators have. It is quite simple economics. If I borrow ¤40 today but do not have to pay it back for 40 years at a rate of interest of 3%, with inflation and so forth, that constitutes debt forgiveness. Far from mortgaging our children's future, what we are doing is liberating our children's future. We will be making finances-----