Collins: Ruling ‘weakens political system’

Independent TD Joan Collins has lost her Supreme Court appeal over the issuing by the Minister for Finance of €31bn promissory notes in 2009 for Anglo Irish Bank and other financial institutions.

The six-judge court yesterday unanimously rejected the TD’s core argument that the minister had no power, under the 2008 law authorising him to issue the notes, to allocate unlimited sums of public money without those first being quantified and considered by the Oireachtas.

The Credit Institutions (Financial Support) Act 2008 was enacted with the aim of averting a banking collapse.