Fianna Fáil: Banking probe has hand tied behind back

The banking inquiry will get under way with "one hand tied behind its back", according to the opposition who said the Government has already shown signs that hearings will be prejudiced by partisan politics.

Fianna Fáil’s finance spokesperson, Michael McGrath, who will sit on the nine-person committee examining the circumstances surrounding the banking collapse, said comments by the Labour leader put the long-awaited inquiry on the wrong footing.

In a Dáil debate on its establishment, Eamon Gilmore said this Government “has spent the last three years picking up the pieces of a disastrous banking crisis and the equally disastrous response to it.”

Mr McGrath said the Tánaiste’s speech was “laced with political innuendo and does not set the right tone for the commencement of what is a very important inquiry.”

He said he would not be seeking to protect the former leaders of his party, including Brian Cowen and Bertie Ahern, when they come before the inquiry.

“I will hold them to account without fear or favour, just as I will do in respect of every other witnesses,” he said.

The Dáil yesterday voted on seven TDs who will sit on the inquiry committee, including its chairman, Labour’s Ciarán Lynch. Two members will also be nominated by the Seanad.

While the terms of reference have not yet been decided, the opposition has argued that it must not be restricted to events running up to the September 2008 bank guarantee.

Independent TD Roisín Shortall said the inquiry would be seen to be “more about politics than establishing the truth” unless it examined a decision by the current Coalition not to burn senior bondholders in the bailed-out banks.

She criticised the “dismissive response” of the former ECB president, Jean Claude Trichet, who recently said he would not appear before the inquiry. This was “completely unacceptable and must be challenged.”

Independent TD Stephen Donnelly said: “I think many people will expect us to fail, expect us to descend into bickering and political opportunism and I hope that doesn’t happen.”

The Taoiseach said people are “entitled to a full account of the banking crisis” and that an Oireachtas committee is “the most appropriate way to establish the full truth.”

The Women for Election organisation said it was “ironic that the banking crisis that was caused by men is now being investigated by all men.”

Who will be on the banking inquiry team?

CHAIR: Ciarán Lynch (Labour)

MEMBERS:

Pearse Doherty(Sinn Féin)

Michael McGrath(Fianna Fáil)

Eoghan Murphy(Fine Gael)

Kieran O’Donnell(Fine Gael)

John Paul Phelan(Fine Gael)

Stephen Donnelly (Independent)

- Two more members will be nominated by the Seanad — one Government and one opposition.