MICHAEL O’REGAN and MARIE O’HALLORAN
Taoiseach Enda Kenny has confirmed that the Government will initiate an Oireachtas investigation into the banking collapse.
Amid heated exchanges on the ongoing Anglo Irish Bank revelations this afternoon, Mr Kenny said the necessary legislation would be processed through the Dail and Seanad.
“We will set up our parliamentary inquiry; we will define the set of terms of reference and move on to get accountability and truth in the people’s interest,’’ he told the Dail during Leaders’ Questions.
All sides of the House strongly condemned the content of the tapes and the individuals involved and demanded Government action.
“The buck stops with the Government and I am going after them,” Mr Kenny said.
Mr Kenny said the tapes had been supplied to the Garda over four years ago as part of its investigation into matters at the bank. That investigation had led to a number of criminal charges being brought.
Mr Kenny revealed that he had visited the Anglo Irish Bank with his party colleague Richard Bruton some weeks after the bank guarantee, when Fine Gael was in opposition. He had received "a wonderful presentation by people who were very well remunerated in their positions and received very large bonuses''.
It has since transpired that all of the presentation was “a tissue and a fabrication of untruths”, he said.
Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin said the contents of the tapes had angered, sickened and shocked people across the country. A comprehensive, independent inquiry was required, but the Government should reflect on whether it should be a parliamentary inquiry. Such an inquiry could not hold non-officeholders to account, he added.
“The people in these tapes cannot be held to account by a parliamentary inquiry,’’ he added.
Mr Kenny said there was a need to get to the truth and remember the victims were tens of thousands of families, ordinary people, who became victims of the axis of collusion between the bank and Fianna Fail and the bankers in general.