I will start where Deputy O'Donoghue left off in his excellent speech. I will just give an overview of where people stand in relation to NAMA. This Bill marks what the Government will present as a final chapter in the State's response to the banking collapse. We are being asked to wind up NAMA and transfer what remains of the IBRC into the NTMA to close the emergency structures created during one of the darkest periods in our financial history. In principle, that is the right thing to do. These bodies were always meant to be temporary. We need to be clear that while the Government is closing the institutions of the crisis, the people are still paying for it. Nowhere is this more obvious or more unjust than in the ongoing existence of the universal social charge. The USC was introduced as a temporary emergency tax. The public were told it was temporary and necessary in a time of crisis and it would be removed when the crisis passed. The Government is telling us today that the crisis is over, NAMA is being shut down and the IBRC is being wrapped up. We are being told the clean-up is complete. Here is the simple question. If the crisis is over, why is the USC still being taken out of workers' wages every week? We have to be honest about it. The USC has become a permanent tax by stealth. It is no longer an emergency measure and no longer temporary. It is now baked into the system, quietly taking from pay packets across the country. The people who are paying it are the very same people who had no role whatsoever in causing the banking collapse. They are ordinary workers and families trying to make ends meet, people in communities all over Ireland who were already stretched and are stretched even further now with the cost of living. They did their part, carried the burdens and paid what they were asked to pay, and now, when the State is closing the very institution that justified that USC charge, these same people are being told that nothing changes for them. This is not fairness or honesty, and the public can see straight through it. If NAMA can be wound up and the IBRC can be consigned to history, the Government needs to explain why one of the most visible symbols of that crisis, the USC, remains firmly in place. Otherwise, people will rightly conclude that while the crisis may be over for the State, it is not over for them. That brings us back to the Bill, which transfers enormous powers to the NTMA, including litigation, asset management and broad confidentiality provisions. As we do that, we must not allow transparency to disappear along with NAMA. We need firm guarantees that the Oireachtas will retain real oversight, reporting will be full and accessible and every remaining asset, liability and legal matter is fully accounted for. The taxpayers paid for this system and the taxpayers deserve the full truth at the end. We should complete the wind-down of NAMA and close these bodies, but the public should not be asked to accept closure when they are still footing the bill. The end of the banking crisis must mean something real for people who paid for it. That means not just shutting down institutions but finally addressing the unfair, so-called temporary burdens that were supposed to go with those institutions. Deputy O'Donoghue raised the issue of the good, honest business people and householders who tried their level best to communicate with NAMA and get out of a crisis. Not everybody wants to screw the State, to use an unsavoury word, and not everybody has that in mind, but people do fall into difficulties. Like the Minister of State and many other Deputies, I have dealt with numerous people in that situation who wanted to pay their way out, and sit down and do a deal, but who were refused by NAMA and the vulture funds. It was all one big happy connection. It was a case of grabbing people's property, putting them out of business and destroying their lives. How many people have died because of this? It is an astonishing question to ask, but I guarantee the Government has no understanding. How many people died in despair? How many people went home and ended their lives? The Government is afraid to answer that question because it is a true fact. It is a fact. They lost their lives because they lost their businesses and homes. They begged for help but they got nothing in return from a State that cost them their lives. It cost people their businesses but, more importantly, it cost people their lives. It is astonishing that it will never, ever be known. It is the hidden secret and crisis of this country, where people would not sit down with those who were facing difficult times because they borrowed. They over-borrowed. I accept that but they wanted to negotiate their way out. That was true of so many of them I met and on whose behalf I pleaded but we were met with deaf ears. It is an awful situation for people to find themselves in, about to lose the home their children are living in or their business that provides food for their families, be they man or woman. I represented so many of them. I saw them and I know where they ended up because of it and that is a shocking indictment of a Government that does not care. The USC is a pittance for the Government to hand back to the State after what it has taken from people and what it has cost this country. That was under the leadership of Fianna Fáil. The bodies in place, whether vulture funds or NAMA, should have sat down with the people who wanted to sit down and found a way forward, rather than just grabbing. Let us call them what they were - vultures. That is what they turned out to be.

Sentiment score: -0.17