Madam, – I am dismayed that the Government is planning to use the public private partnership (PPP) model to manage the national debt, Nama and individual loans to banks – just to get the fact of a €54 billion overhead off the national balance sheet.
On the basis of 16 years’ involvement in the PPP process, I assert that the PPP model is unaccountable and, therefore, vulnerable to fraud from within the “special purpose vehicle”. It is possible to identify examples. Fraud in a material infrastructure project may be repaired, albeit at a cost. But fraud in the context of national debt, etc, especially when we have bought a first “pup” in the shape of over-valued toxic loans, introduces quite a different scale of risk for the nation.
I imagine citizen taxpayers will share my concern that I have never yet managed to get our Department of Finance to acknowledge such problems. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – I have to describe Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan’s planned creation of the special purpose vehicle to facilitate the functioning of the new National Asset Management Agency as insane (Home News, October 21st). Insane in the sense that the only vehicle Mr Lenihan should be looking to procure for the State in view of his handling of the financial undulations of late should be capable of warp-speed, so he can readily reach the escape velocity needed to cross the event horizon of this financial black-hole that is currently sucking every cent from the coffers of the State, and the butt of the IMF’s tail-pocket.
I would suggest he tyre-kick Nasa’s new Ares-1 rocket retailing at a cool €100 million. Either that or he contact Nasa to establish if the 700 sensors on board this rocket could be fine-tuned to the nuances of the Irish economy. Which, as of writing (Iseq -6.5 per cent) may not last the two minutes of the glorious Nasa test flight. – Yours, etc,