‘I CAN’T SET THE POLICE ON THE BANKS’ SAYS LEO
THE Taoiseach has said he cannot order the Garda Fraud Squad to investigate the banks over the tracker mortgage scandal.
Despite criticism from the opposition at the Government’s perceived failure to get tough with the banks, Leo Varadkar said he is not able to direct the gardaí to do as he requests.
‘This is a democracy. A complaint is made to the gardaí and they then decide whether or not it needs to carry out an investigation or a raid,’ he said.
Despite his partners in Government, the Independent Alliance, demanding a criminal investigation Mr Varadkar repeated: ‘The Government doesn’t have the authority to send in the Garda or the fraud squad – and I wouldn’t like to live in a country, where politicians could order in the police or the fraud squad in the way some people have suggested.’
He added: ‘If people believe a crime has been committed, if they have evidence, they should report that to the gardaí.’
But he warned: ‘There’s a difference between breach of contract and criminal fraud. There is a difference in our law between civil and criminal matters, but there is a way to deal with both of them.’
It is going to take a long time for the Irish people to have trust again in the banking system, the Taoiseach said yesterday as the Tánaiste warned the public’s trust was ‘deeply shattered’.
Mr Varadkar said: ‘What’s happened with the mortgage tracker scandal, coming on top of the banking crisis, makes it very hard for anyone to trust the banks.’
He added: ‘We’re not operating on the basis of trust, here. [Finance] Minister Donohoe has met the banks. They have agreed to a set of actions within a timeline that they have said that they can meet and if they don’t meet it, then we are in a strong position to take further action.’
Mr Varadkar said the Government would make a distinction between banks that meet their obligations and those that don’t.
‘I don’t believe that collective
punishment would be the solution here. We are going to need to be able to distinguish between banks and lenders that have fulfilled their obligations and those that have not.’
Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe made no comment last night as he was doorstepped by journalists.
Michael D’Arcy, Minister of State at the Department of Finance and Public Expenditure and Reform, defended the Government’s Christmas deadline, however, and denied there had been a failure to impose meaningful sanctions.
‘I don’t think the coverage has been fair. Ninety per cent of those cases now known about will be repaid with redress by Christmas – that’s 12,000 cases,’ he said.
‘If we go to court it will take years but the end of the year is only ten weeks away.’