Madam, – Why is the Government proposing to use Nama to prevent a decline in property prices at a time when Ireland has the second highest cost of living in the EU?
Surely, it should be encouraging lower prices, as these would result in cheaper houses, lower shop prices and more competitive commercial and industrial rents. Instead, taxpayers are expected to underwrite a multi-billion punt on Nama to ensure that property prices don’t fall and that the country remains uncompetitive. – Yours, etc,
BRIAN FLANAGAN,
Ardmeen Park,
Blackrock,
Co Dublin.
Madam, – We cannot continue to have a private banking system in which the failure of a bank is impossible.
Mr Lenihan likes to tell us that we cannot afford a Lehman Brothers and he is right. But what he fails to tell us is that the collapse of Lehman Brothers was not the cause of the current financial crisis, rather it was a result of it. Lehman Brothers was an insolvent financial institution and it deserved to fail. There is no doubt that its failure could have been managed in a more orderly way, but its failure was necessary.
Almost one year after our own banking crisis became apparent, the Minister is still propping up six financial institutions. In this time he could have moved towards an orderly winding up of some these institutions, but he has failed to do so. He says nationalisation of these banks is undesirable, but what could be more undesirable than propping up failed institutions indefinitely with the taxpayers’ money?
Either banks are public utilities which should be run for the benefit of the public or they are private institutions run for the benefit of their shareholders. They cannot be both and if they are to be the latter then they must be subject to the discipline of market.
The Minister should use the final year of the guarantee to put in place a bank failure regime. Such a regime might be the death warrant for a number of the guaranteed institutions but it would go a long way to restoring Ireland’s reputation as a market driven economy. – Yours, etc,
DES FULLAM,
All Hallows Green,
Drumcondra,
Dublin 9.
Madam, – Sarah Carey (Opinion, August 19th) in her support of nationalisation states, “The only people who won’t like it are those who’ve been buying bank shares for the past three months and they shouldn’t matter to us” She has totally forgotten about the thousands of elderly people and pensioners who invested in bank shares for their “nest egg” which has diminished by 90 per cent.
Is she the cuckoo in the nest wishing to destroy the egg completely? – Yours, etc,
WG CONDON,
Monaloe Avenue,
Blackrock,
Co Dublin.
Madam, – On the RTÉ 1 TV Nama news today I spotted a figure on the wall of the Treasury Building. Is this a taxpayer? If it is, is he/she going up or going down? – Yours, etc,
JIM O’CONNOR,
Bayview Drive,
Killiney,
Co Dublin.
Madam, – We don’t know whether the speculators who are responsible for the bank crisis are to pay back with interest the total amount they borrowed, or whether we, the ordinary tax- paying citizens, are bailing them out and allowing them to keep the wealth they amassed during Bertie’s boom years?
All the spokespeople and economic experts seem to avoid this question.
We have already been left with a nationalised bank by the name of Anglo Irish Bank and we have seen the shenanigans around loans for shares etc. Who is to say that the same builders and land speculators will not benefit from the purchase of knock-down prices from Nama? – Yours, etc,
ALASTAIR WHITE,
Foxrock Manor,
Dublin 18.