There was widespread support in the Seanad this morning for calls by the Central Bank Governor for an Oireachtas inquiry into the role of the banks in the financial crisis. Professor Patrick Honohan was speaking at the Oireachtas Committee on Economic Regulatory Affairs yesterday.
Read more on what Professor Honohan said here
Green Party Senator Dan Boyle said it was widely recognised that there would be further recapitalisation of the banks. He supported the idea of an inquiry, saying it was important to get as many facts out as quickly as possible.
Fine Gael Senator Paul Coughlan said similar inquiries had served other countries well. He pointed out that those who he said had steered the ships onto the rocks were still in situ at the highest levels of the banks.
Independent Senator Shane Ross called on the House to subvert the normal channels and initiate an inquiry in the Senate. He said the procedures were there already and suggested that the model of the DIRT inquiry should be used.
Senator Ross said the inquiry need not be an expensive legal witch hunt but an exercise in letting the public see those who were responsible for the crisis and walked away leaving a deficit of €20 billion.
Fianna Fáil Senator Terry Leyden said the Oireachtas would be well qualified to carry out such an inquiry. However, he said the bankers had not learned much from the DIRT inquiry.
Professor Honohan said yesterday that he expected the Oireachtas to instigate some form of inquiry to try to understand the deeper underlying problems of the financial crisis, so that wider lessons could be learned for the future.
