OPINION:THROUGH THE miasma of obfuscation that wafted about the banking scandal last week, there came a flash of such illuminating clarity that it made the heart sing. It came via the voice of George Lee, RTÉ's economics editor on Thursday's
Morning Ireland. He was angry. He was animated, excited and annoyed, writes
PETER MURTAGH.
And he used the F word. Several times! It’s fraud! said George. A fraudulent transaction . . . a filthy transaction. It’s an absolute outrage.
God but it was good to hear someone use the sort of terminology that is the bare minimum required. After all the weasel words and waffle, what has been unfolding for weeks was finally being characterised appropriately.
Waffle has been the meat of discourse in our society for generations and, most times, it doesn’t matter too much. But in a crisis of the dimensions now facing us (the potential collapse of the State into bankruptcy), waffle just won’t cut it.
When word emerged last week of the cosy revolving door arrangement between Anglo Irish Bank and Irish Life Permanent, during which €7 billion was shuffled between the two giving anyone looking the impression that Anglo was a solvent, safe bet, it was described as “window dressing”.
Harmless, eh? No one’s ever seen a €7 billion display in Clerys . . . How can something that is self-evidently designed to deceive the markets and shareholders be described as something as innocent as window dressing? With George Lee’s comments still echoing in our ears (for this listener at any rate), Friday brought resignations – not sackings but resignations.
How can the board of a major financial institution accept the resignation of someone who clearly had done something wrong while at the same time stating that the person, group finance director Peter Fitzpatrick, “always acted with the utmost integrity and professionalism”?
Equally, how can it be said the second director to depart, head of group treasury David Gantly, showed an “extremely high level of integrity and professionalism”? Both men have obviously been horribly wronged. So too has the departing but still in place ILP chief executive, Denis Casey, whose resignation the board eventually accepted with the “utmost regret”. Casey, according to ILP chairman Gillian Bowler was “a man of the highest integrity and honour”.
When journalists and commentators began asking questions about Ireland’s financial regulatory mechanisms they were denounced for allegedly “talking us into a recession”. There were phone calls from the office of the Financial Regulator and certain estate agents.
What is now apparent is that those early critiques of our property-fuelled boom and what was going on in the IFSC were prescient if mild and seriously understated the problem.
The weasel words struck me this week because of an e-mail from a civil service clerical officer.“I cannot afford or secure a mortgage to buy a home for myself and my daughter, and do not wish to live off the state or county council in a council house. “I cannot afford my salary to be reduced. I work extremely hard and am extremely dedicated to my job . . . I am mentally, emotionally and physically exhausted after each day’s work, when I return to my daughter in the evenings to put her to bed, and prepare for another day.”
This young woman earns €27,000 a year. Financial regulator Patrick Neary, who was supposed to police the financial system, got a €630,000 payoff for going early and a pension of €140,000 a year. Brian Goggin of the Bank of Ireland wonders how he’ll get by on €2 million.
Words fail.