Sir, - AIB is very much in the news lately for making record profits and for giving what might best be called "soft loans" to politicians.
However, despite the record profits, the unfortunate taxpayer is still subsidising the bank to the tune of a 2 per cent levy on all insurance policies to repay the losses it made in the Insurance Company of Ireland debacle. It is strange that when a company makes a commercial misjudgement, the public should have to continue to pay for its bail-out. It is even stranger when the company is making record profits, and could easily afford to repay itself the losses it made in ICI. Possibly the politicians do not take action because too many of them are indebted one way or another to the bank. - Yours, etc., Thomas McDonogh,
St Paul's Road, Galway.