Banking enquiry- Public or private?

Spiritoftheseventies

As the title suggests should banking enquiry be public or private. I personally think it should be public. Another own goal by our government.

chughes

Maybe a poll could be set up on this thread to vote for public or private. I'd vote for public.

Spiritoftheseventies

yeah doesnt seem to be a poll facility here for thread. Tried looking for one.

yoshytoshy

If its public it will cost more and take longer ,I think.
We can't afford entertainment like this anymore ,especially as no one ever gets done.

Spiritoftheseventies

yoshytoshy wrote: »

If its public it will cost more and take longer ,I think.
We can't afford entertainment like this anymore ,especially as no one ever gets done.

yeah but we can't trust government to be transparent about this. Has to be before an Oireachtas all party committee for it to have any credibility.

yoshytoshy

Whats the aim of it though ? ,maybe we should decide what we want from it first and then have the inquiry.

That would rustle a few feathers:)

Cork Boy

I'd rather the inquiry not be commissioned until at least June 2012, better a real inquiry come later rather than a whitewash now.

Laminations

The inquiry should be public and its pointless unless it can make personal rulings (not rulings of guilt, rulings of fact). If its just going to look at what went wrong it will just be a waste of money to merely restate 'best banking practice' when its done.

Best banking practice- do x to achieve y, never do z to achieve y.
Then the banking crisis happens and a private inquiry out of which comes the revelation- bankers did z to achieve y. in future do x to achieve y.

Biggins

Public.

Liam Byrne

Public and televised.

Sleepy

Public and held in the Criminal Courts with cases prepared by the DPP.

Spiritoftheseventies

Sleepy wrote: »

Public and held in the Criminal Courts with cases prepared by the DPP.

Yes we should make this an election issue. Last time Bertie got in while still being investigated by the tribunal. Would public have voted for him if they had known the full facts.

Cork Boy

Unfortunately yes. And we did know the facts regarding Manchester payments, blank cheques for Haughy, etc.

Zuiderzee

It needs to be public
It needs to have a time limit
It must not be milked by the lawyers like tribunals
It should be like the DIRT investgation

Justice must be done - And seen to be done.

But FF will want to hold out until after a General election, if anything to limit losses.

Any politician who recieved loans from any bank, like McCreevey, that were outside the norm - this has to be known.
Did your TD, councillor, County Manager, planning officer, environment officer or a senior civil servant get a loan that bypased normal channels?

Spiritoftheseventies

Cork Boy wrote: »

I'd rather the inquiry not be commissioned until at least June 2012, better a real inquiry come later rather than a whitewash now.

When is the next General Election officially due for.

Cork Boy

May 2012

Spiritoftheseventies

Cork Boy wrote: »

May 2012

so like they call the election, somehow manage to into power And hold the enquiry after. Leopards and the spots as they say.

Cork Boy

They'll want the inquiry now so its held on their terms, not FG's.

In the unlikely event they get into power again, they won't bother with an inquiry - its not like they'd have to worry about a voter backlash now is it?

Alcatel

Do it like they did DIRT.

I'll be frank and say something that I think is on the tip of all of our lips: We think that our government doesn't want a public inquiry because there's a good chance, if past evidence is anything to go by, that once we look up every tree and under every stone (as Bertie once said), we'll find out that many senior and well positioned people in the realms of Irish power are crooks.

average_runner

Enquiry is a waste of time and money and no one can do time for it.


All we are going to find out is that banks over lend to the public and the public were stupid enough to take the money without doing a few sums, like what if we have kids, what if we lost one job, what if in future the interest rates hit 6%??

And if a TD or councillor got a loan that is a dodgy, so what if he/she has or is able to paid it back as all us mortage holders were offer dodgy mortages of vast amount that we could not afford.

Fine gael and labour want a public enquiry to look good to the public but when ask who would pay for it, they were quick enough to say the tax payer. Last thing we need is more money to be wasted.

As for Bertie Ahern, if might be guilty but he is still innocent as the Tribunal produce anything saying he is guilty yet, no official documentation.

Laminations

average_runner wrote: »

Enquiry is a waste of time and money and no one can do time for it.


All we are going to find out is that banks over lend to the public and the public were stupid enough to take the money without doing a few sums, like what if we have kids, what if we lost one job, what if in future the interest rates hit 6%??

And if a TD or councillor got a loan that is a dodgy, so what if he/she has or is able to paid it back as all us mortage holders were offer dodgy mortages of vast amount that we could not afford.

Fine gael and labour want a public enquiry to look good to the public but when ask who would pay for it, they were quick enough to say the tax payer. Last thing we need is more money to be wasted.

As for Bertie Ahern, if might be guilty but he is still innocent as the Tribunal produce anything saying he is guilty yet, no official documentation.

The inquiry is only a waste of money if its scope is limited, if its held in private and if it isn't given a definitive early finish date

Fintan O'Toole as per usual hits the nail on the head
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2010/0119/1224262632178.html


As for Bertie Ahern if he is found innocent his conduct in office and at the tribunal was still dispicable

JonathanAnon

Public, televised with executions afterwards, like the Nuremberg Trials. I would rather have NOTHING than the cover up that is suggested by FF/Greens. It will just be a waste of money, nobody will be prosecuted (when it's obvious with the illegal money transfers and cooking of books that somebody should be), and all of the same cn*ts that ruined the country will be a) happy in retirement with a huge pension or b) still in their position on the board of the bank.

Gombeen country.... Zero accountability for public servants and banking friends of public servants..

galwayrush

Why do we need an inquiry?, give the powers to CAB to investigate and prosecute anyone guilty of misconduct, whether they are bankers or members of the Government.

average_runner

Even if its held public it is still limited. As the legal experts said on the radio we will be able to force anyone hired by the state to attend it, we cant force anyone else to attend it.

The Enquiry will not have any power to send someone to jail for it even if its public/private.


This whole idea came from fine gael and labour so they look good in front of the general public, thats all it was from them a PR stunt.


Right now as a country we need to get things back on track and get finances in order, Lenihan made some good progress lately even the EU are impressed by it.

And it take alot to impress them lately after what we done!

Spiritoftheseventies

the funny thing is partner of that whistleblower on Prime Time doc was dismissed by Irish Nationwide. Yet haven't heard of one charge been made yet against anyone inside financial institutions. Time and time again govt has chance to show they are capable of doing right thing but its all about staying in power at any cost for them.

http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/whistleblowers-partner-was-dismissed-by-irish-nationwide-2017437.html

Zuiderzee

I liked this blog

http://celticmeltdown.webs.com/corruption.htm

Iceland, like Ieland is a small country where local connections and ties mean a lot.

Lets ave a public enquiry, run by someone who is independent of our systems

Eva Joly sems like the right person.

edanto

Public, public, public.

I can't really say it any better than Dr. Constantin Gurdgiev over on his blog http://trueeconomics.blogspot.com/2010/01/economics-20012010-banking-inquiry.html .... so I'll just paste in what he said.

I have three simple points to contribute to all the discussion concerning the Banking Inquiry proposals:

Any Inquiry must be fully public, to the point of live television broadcast of all proceedings. Imagine a case of not one, not two, but six largest hospitals in the nation recording serial acts of systemic malpractice that were to result in some Euro 70 billion worth of damages. Would Mr Cowen call for a closed-doors inquiry?

Any Inquiry must be swift and must lead to convictions and severe punishment of anyone found guilty of malpractice or non-fulfillment of duties (including public officials in charge of regulatory and supervisory functions, should they be found guilty). Imagine a total collapse of six largest bridges in the country at the peak traffic - would Mr Cowen sum up the situation as 'We are where we are, now is not the time to deal with the past'?

Any Inquiry that does not cover Nama and Banks Guarantee scheme will simply fail to deliver full account of the causes and the full extent of the damages caused by the current crisis.

This is why I oppose an idea of the 'wise men'-drafted preliminary report to set terms of reference for the second stage inquiry. Given this Cabinet will be selecting the 'wise men', I have serious doubts as to the integrity of the process or the group put in charge of restricting any direction of the future inquiry.

Ireland needs its own Truth & Reconciliation Commission to deal with the systemic failures of our supervisory, regulatory and banking systems. If public operation of such a Commission results in irreparable damage inflicted on our banks - how can one tell?

After all, with Anglo at the helm, these banks have already done enough to damage themselves. The price of keeping them alive on artificial respirator of paucity, opacity and public cash is the collapse of public trust in our institutions and in our financial system - a price that is much higher than the withdrawal of all international bond holders from Ireland Inc can ever be.

After all, am I the only person one noticing the complete and total ethical collapse of our social system that takes ordinary folks' money to pay the cost of the full and unlimited guarantee of the (largely) foreign bondholders in Irish banks, while their own deposits are now under the risk of being covered by a limited guarantee up to Euro100K?

Truthrevolution

It should most definitely be a public enquiry, similar to what their doing in the UK with the Iraq investigations.For a while now this government has been trying to cover the criminal neglegance of these banking institutions but with some pressure mounting have now decided to investigate these banks behind closed doors.Its simply not good enough

chughes

I think it's time to re-release the Boomtown Rats song, Banana Republic. It's sentiment might just catch the mood of the majority of people and so should go straight to number one.

bonzos

FF and the greens know at this stage that nothing shocks the irish public and it has gotten to the stage where corruption is just a part of irish poltical life....the polls in last fews days have shown that they are becoming more popular dispite all that has happened in recent times.In many ways you cant really blame them for screwing us because the know that the irish public have become so immune being lead by crooks what ever they do it will be forgottin about in a few days.

Irlandese

There is an obvious reason for this. Most politicians in the Dail have close relationships with both bankers and builders and would be open to at least critiscism if not arrest if the enquiry took a public and a fully open format.
There has been no attempt to get serious fraud squad investigations underway with regard to possibly corrupt relationships between politicians who voted for bank bail outs and their banks. Banks treat polliticians as "SPECIAL CASES" for loans and any party post holder in a government or opposition party are automatically given favoured loan status and lower rates.
There is already a comprehensive USA enquiry that should have been the model used. You can visit it's open site at http://www.fcic.gov/
I have heard vof a new "whistle-blowers" group of civil servants,bankers and lawyers who are planning some kind of public outing of shADY RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN POLITICIANS AND BUILDEERS AND BANKERS. Can anyone advise me how to get some interesting news to them?

Irlandese

I agree entirely.
The USA have an open enquiry with an open web-site. Have a look at it at http://www.fcic.gov/

There is some kind of a whistle-blowers group starting up with bank staff, lawyers and civil servants involved. I was told that they plan to share information about politicians dirty dealings with builders and banks, giving names and specifics. If this is true, I have some good stuff for them. Does anyone know how to contact them??

Overheal

Spiritoftheseventies wrote: »

As the title suggests should banking enquiry be public or private. I personally think it should be public. Another own goal by our government.

"Federal Reserve Seeks to Block US Bailout Secrets"

Overheal wrote: »

http://bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a4PnUdySIink&pos=5

Banks and the Fed warn that bailed-out lenders may be hurt if the documents are made public, causing a run or a sell-off by investors. Disclosure may hamstring the Fed’s ability to deal with another crisis, they also argued. The lower court agreed with Bloomberg.

This.

SLUSK wrote:

Do you think the FED should be allowed to do massive bailout programs and not let the public now how the money is spent?

In a similar chime, should I be able to view your medical records if and when the government pays for your hip surgery?

Seemed a relevant response, here as well as there.

nesf

Spiritoftheseventies wrote: »

yeah but we can't trust government to be transparent about this. Has to be before an Oireachtas all party committee for it to have any credibility.

Sweet mother of God no. Public yes, Oireachtas committee no, it'd be like sending a bunch of monkeys to fix your car and then bitching when it broke down again.

The only useful inquiry will be a technical one done by experts. Politicians will just spend all their time making hay and finding ways to blame it on FF.

Liam Byrne

nesf wrote: »

Politicians will just spend all their time making hay and finding ways to blame it on FF.

Did you accidentally leave out the word "not" ? Or do you genuinely believe this ?

FF spent months pretending that the whole mess was down to "international factors", so the above has already been done.

FF in government, FF leader appointing incompetent friends, FF leader telling those who warned him to cop on to - well, y'know....

Who else IS there to blame ?

Spiritoftheseventies

on a related matter Ray Darcy show doing something on banks decision to chase after those who have defaulted on their mortgages. This follows the end of the one your moratorium which is has ended or is due to end fairly soon.

Liam Byrne

Liam Byrne wrote: »

Did you accidentally leave out the word "not" ? Or do you genuinely believe this ?

FF spent months pretending that the whole mess was down to "international factors", so the above has already been done.

FF in government, FF leader appointing incompetent friends, FF leader telling those who warned him to cop on to - well, y'know....

Who else IS there to blame ?

Who else?? There's plenty of responsibility to go around. Its highly unlikely that the FF politicians would be capable of organising all of this on their own. So we have lawyers, accountants, business men, etc all part of the problem and aware of what they were doing.

I agree FF needs to be targeted, but lets also take this chance to make an example of those that helped them screw up this country.

Any investigation needs to be public, and have actual powers to prosecute. If its just for information purposes, then it will cost a fortune, and do nothing in the end. I would also say it needs to be done sooner rather than later, while there is public support/interest. Given time the public will lose interest, and forget the anger they felt over being betrayed. Which I expect the politicians (from every party) know, and this investigation will be delayed, and delayed.

chrysagon

well aint it just dandy that theres a strong possibility of banking enquiry collapsing!!!