Greens back Oireachtas enquiry into banking collapse

The Green Party has supported a suggestion by the Bord Snip Nua head Colm McCarthy for an Oireachtas enquiry to be set up to examine the failure of Ireland's banks.

Finance spokesperson Senator Dan Boyle said: "I agree with Mr McCarthy's opinion that the general public still hasn’t had a thorough explanation of what went wrong with the Irish banking system.

"The role of that our financial regulators played in the banking collapse will be examined in a different forum, and I have strong hopes that the ongoing investigations of the Director of Corporate Enforcement and others will lead to the prosecutions of those in the banking system that broke the law.

"But as of yet there is no opportunity for the senior bankers – some of the best-paid people in our society – to account for the catastrophic failures in their organisations, for which we will all have to pay.

"In the next weeks the Dáil and the Seanad will examine legislation to set up a National Asset Management Agency. This is probably the most significant piece of legislation that this Government or any government in recent decades will have had to pass, and because of that there is genuine public concern – especially as some of the people who got us into this mess have yet to be called to account for their actions," he said.