"Bailout myth is a cocktail of half-truths and downright evasions"

[Brendan Burgess]

A great article by Stephen Collins in today's Irish Times

It is only right and just that the [FF and Green] government which presided over the excesses of the boom should take primary responsibility for all that went wrong, with the bankers and regulators coming a close second. Senior public servants, the then Opposition parties, trade union leaders and the media too, for the most part, failed to understand what was happening and responded too slowly or even obstructively when the crisis struck.

In particular, the article is good about the Greens:

It is some irony that the Greens who preached prudence during the Celtic Tiger years and warned repeatedly about the dangers of relying on the construction industry should now face extinction as a result of going into government with those who fuelled the boom.


In government the Greens showed courage when the roof caved in by sticking with the decisions required to stave off disaster rather than running away at the first opportunity.

In a similar way, Labour is acting very responsibly now, although they are suffering hugely from it in terms of popular support.

One issue which Collins has not mentioned is that the retrospective unlimited guarantee which we gave to depositors and bondholders was done on our own initiative without any consultation with the EU or ECB.

 

[Purple]

Excellent article but could have done with some more detail.

 

[jpd]

No doubt plenty more details will be issued when the next Dail election loom into view.

Although I suspect that the conflicting claims will muddy the waters rather than bring any clarity to the subject