Purging the banks - Bankers must be held to account

THE bankers, auditors and credit committee members Fine Gael’s Michael Noonan has in his crosshairs would be very foolish to imagine that his clear-your-desk ultimatum would not have the whole-hearted support of virtually everyone in this bruised and beggared country.

Though there seems to be a growing determination to look forward, those who held senior banking or supervisory positions during the wild west years, and are still in place, delude themselves if they imagine their betrayals have been forgotten.

Mr Noonan is right to say that it is “untenable” that so many of those at the centre of the banking lunacy remain in office. He might have added that it is untenable too that the bank chiefs who did step down were invariably replaced by colleagues sometimes compromised by their proximity to the behaviour that destroyed our economy.