James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael)
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Question 68: To ask the Minister for Finance if, in view of the discrepancy and increase in bad debt provision at Anglo Irish Bank over a six month period, he or the relevant agency or authority has undertaken an independent review or audit of the current debt and potential bad debts currently being carried out at major banks here; if he will lay a report of the bad debt exposure at major banks here before the Members of the Houses of the Oireachtas in a timely manner in order that they can make fully informed decisions on future financial measures he may be considering laying before the Members for consideration in the near future; if he has not started such a review, if such a review will be carried out as soon as possible; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [25526/09]

Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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The Deputy will be aware from my previous reports to the House that PWC has carried out reviews of the loan books and the capital position of six of the covered institutions. Since then, additional due diligence reviews of Anglo Irish Bank, Allied Irish Banks and Bank of Ireland have been carried out, building on the assessments carried out by PWC.

As I have previously stated, I am not in a position to release information contained in these reviews, other than what has been released to date, because of the commercially sensitive nature of the information.

It was arising from our assessment of the initial reviews of the bad debts of the Irish financial institutions that the Government decided to establish the National Assets Management Agency to ensure that the loan books of the financial institutions were freed up to allow them to lend to the real economy. As I announced in early April, the potential book value of loans that will be transferred to NAMA is in the region of €80 to €90 billion. However, the amount paid by NAMA will be considerably less than this since loans will only be transferred at an appropriate written down value.