NAMA - Words, Sentences, Theories Abound In Ireland

international | rights, freedoms and repression | opinion/analysis Sunday May 03, 2009 16:30 by Michelle Clarke - Social Justice and Ethics: Dignity

What can we the plain people of Ireland contribute to the theorists, the politicians, the business people, the developers, the professions......i would suggest a little common sense is needed.

What can we, the plain people of Ireland, contribute to the Theorists, Government politicians, the Bankers, the professions, the economists - to those who have constructed NAMA. These are the people we must learn to trust and if this is so, we the plain people of Ireland must be able to contribute our views, in a collective way, as part of the people grassroots press.

The common sense view is free and this is about democracy.

Simon Carswell has written an excellent book which is called 'Something rotten - Irish Banking Scandals'. It is worth reading particularly if you can recall the Banking Scandals that have already occurred in Ireland.

As reminder, they read as follows:

- Irish Trust Bank and Ken Bates - Ireland first major banking collapse

- Patrick Gallagher and Merchant Banking, the downfall of a property tycoon (I remember this particularly well)

- PMPA, the failure of Ireland's biggest insurance company and the lost deposits

- Insurance Corporation of Ireland: the State's bail out of Ireland's biggest bank

- Edmund Farrell, his removal from Irish permanent

- Ansbacher: a secret bank for Ireland's golden circle

- National Irish bank, encouraging tax evasion and ripping off customers

- The DIRT Scandal, bogus non resident accounts......

- Offshore tax evasion, nowhere left to hide hot money (Not true, FT makes interesting reading about offshore accounts)

- Politicians and the banks, clearing debts for VIP cusomters

- John Rusnak lost $691 million

- AIB and Foreign Exchange

- AIB and the Faldor scandal

George Santayana speaks words of wisdom, 'those who forget history are condemned to repeat it'.

I ask how did Ireland get caught out by developers, banks, business people, brokers, etc. at such quick haste from the last financial crisis, as experienced by most people in a certain age group, given the chapters in Simon Carswell's book, as highlighted above.

How much of where we are at, is in fact due to the Global emphasis undertaken worldwide from the 1980's onward.

Wednesday Irish Times 29th April 2009, I noticed a most intriguing article from Simon Carswell, Finance Correspondent.

We all are aware that Swenden encountered a similar crisis circa 1990. There is a Swedish model per consequence. A valuer who was appointed by the Swedish Government to a nominated 'vehicle' to determine property values during Sweden's banking crisis reported that there was a period OF DENIAL ABOUT THE PROBLEMS IN THE MARKET....HE WENT ON TO SAY THAT THIS CAN 'DESTROY' THE VALUE OF PROPERTIES.

Now this is a gem of wisdom to those of us around in the early 1980's, those of us forced to emigrate, then 1990's in the UK etc.
This is the time, we are least at guard.........this is the time, we need to take a deep breath and open our minds to solutions as distinct from blaming people. The people we blame have already lost significant sums of money, we need to ensure they don't take to the 'Bottle' or no good practices. We need to harness strengths with good common sense.

We all can make a contribution. Some people have real common sense and are not driven by the profit motive. Tap into this.

Today on Radio 1, RTE. Professor Honohan, Trinity College spoke and his words were blunt. If the Government did not give the guarantee, AIB and Bank of Ireland would be insolvent right now. He went on to say, some powerful political party had a very unhealthy relationship with property developers for too long. We are now worse off than Iceland according to Professor Honohan. He stated that Iceland was gettings its act together internally and there is a slight improvement in their economy. Ireland, he said has got to face up to some hard facts. He welcomed NAMA WITH A CAUTION and that caution being, it has to be independent of any political interference. NOTHING HAS REALLY CHANGED SINCE LEMASS.

Michelle Clarke.