In August 2007, then Minister for Finance Brian Cowen gave an address to the Humbert Summer School.  It’s worth reading it all (scroll down to comments) to see the hubris that characterised this vintage of Fianna Fail – at a time when the banking system was already fatally compromised.

Note this part:

They [the public] did so in spite of the unprecedented pressure which he [Bertie] had come through in the first weeks of the campaign. The public showed that they have an innate sense of fair play and perspective which is willing to hear all of the information before reaching a conclusion. It remains a fact that confidential material was selectively leaked by a person or persons unknown with the sole intent of causing Bertie Ahern significant electoral damage. Only material which might cause damage was leaked, while other material was withheld.

No person should have to go through what Bertie Ahern endured in those weeks and we can learn a lot from the public’s balanced and reflective response. After ten years, the public were not going to be rushed into making a judgement on the Taoiseach. They know him pretty well by now and they understand that he is not motivated by personal gain. They have seen the progress made under his leadership. He has never been a specialist in the soundbite approach to politics, but he has more than made up for this in the substance of his achievements.

Thus Cowen presents not just a judgement on the Mahon leaks around this time — with sources that only the Irish Times could reveal — but also a claim that he and the electorate at large had come to the conclusion that there were no flawed pedigree issues with Bertie. Indeed, Cowen’s reputation was enhanced at the time by the perception that he had taken the FF election campaign by the scruff of the neck from a Mahon-distracted Bertie and led the party to a historic victory. Which part of that legacy will Micheál Martin be disowning?

Insofar as the budget goes, this is actually fair enough: you cast your vote, your representatives emerge and your government is formed to govern until the next election. In between, to try to govern by some imagined public consensus, to steer a course by the uncertain stars of opinion poll and Twitter trend, is a receipe for populism and executive paralysis. Our TDs, for well-canvassed psephological reasons, have always inclined to the view that opinions are for voters to express - via Joe Duffy, the Irish Daily Mail and misspelled constituents’ letters - and for parliamentarians to run with. But the baying of the mob is not a sound basis for good governance.

Irish public figures could have benefitted over the years from listening more closely to one of their illustrious forebears, Edmund Burke, whose Speech to the Electors of Bristol remains the classic statement of the MP’s right and duty to be guided by his own, informed opinion, even if this conflicts with the express wishes of his electorate. A little more aloof paternalism might have brought a crop of TDs more willing to challenge the doomed consensus that helped inflate the bubble.

But this can only go so far, and the Irish Times (naturally) would take judicious flouting of the popular will beyond the Pale. Stephen Collins, discussing the ramifications of a eurozone exit, makes the following extraordinary statement:

“Over the next few months, if all goes well, there will be agreement at EU level to a series of binding budgetary disciplines. This will probably require treaty change and, even though that may result in a bitter referendum, it is very much in Ireland’s interest that it happens. In the long run, such a development will ensure the Irish people will be saved from a repeat of the economic indiscipline and political incompetence that characterised the Bertie Ahern years.”

Now, the government led by Bertie Ahern may well have been indisiplined and incompetent. But the implication of this passage is that submitting our financial affairs to the scrutiny and (possible) veto of the EU is the best – perhaps only - way to avoid a repeat meltdown ”in the long run”. The future financial policy of any Irish government is presented as a ticking timebomb.

This presupposes a complete inability of Irish people to run their own country properly. In effect, Collins would have us transfer significant new powers – amounting perhaps to a complete and permanent surrender of economic sovereignty – to the EU, not because this serves the greater good, but because, left to ourselves, we’ll only bugger it up.

It’s a sinister implication, anti-democratic and cynical. A country cannot realistically be governed by popular will alone, but nor can it be legitimately governed by giving up on representative democracy and handing the hard decisions over to centralised European control. 

Even if we shrug aside these fundamental objections, it’s hard to say whether or not we would be better off in or out of a new, financially integrated eurozone. Certainly, as Collins notes, attempting to pay off our load of euro-demoninated debt in some devalued punt nua would be extremely costly, and therefore exiting the euro would have to happen simultaneously with another radical move: default on sovereign debt, à la Argentina in 2002.

As I noted at the outset, these arguments are complex, and if such are the stark choices that are going to emerge out of this week’s discussions, politics isn’t going to get any simpler for a while yet. I would simply hope that our decisions flow freely, not from fear of our own inherent incompetence.

Has the Irish Presidential election been decided by a lie and the media’s unquestioning belief of it? Why did the Sunday Independent wait until after the election – when the media darling was safely ensconced in the Aras – before revealing what they knew?

What the Sunday Independent now calls SF’s “dirty tricks campaign” may yet end up backfiring on the party in the courts. Under “The Prevention of Electoral Abuses Act, 1923″:

Every person who, before or during any election and for the purpose of affecting the return of any candidate at that election, makes or publishes any false statement of fact in relation to the personal character or conduct of such candidate, and the directors of any body or association corporate which before or during any election and for the purpose aforesaid makes or publishes any such false statement as aforesaid, shall be guilty of an illegal practice.”

SINN Fein Presidential candidate Martin McGuinness is the main suspect in the brutal murder of two policemen, the Herald can reveal.

Sergeant Peter Gilgunn (26) and Constable David Montgomery (20), were gunned down in an IRA ambush as they travelled in an RUC patrol car in Derry.

They were the first police officers to lose their lives in a terrorist incident in the city for 50 years.

The ambush 40 years ago came just three days before Bloody Sunday sent shockwaves right across the Province.
….

The claims further calls SF’s credibility into question hours before the polls open in the Presidential Election. The revelation comes after McGuiness altered his account of Sean Gallagher’s alleged contacts with businessman and former convicted fuel-smuggler and former tax-evader Hugh Morgan.

Sinn Fein’s allegations linking Gallagher to a cheque for €5,000 for FF have been undermined following the revelations that the accuser has convictions for cross-border fuel-smuggling and tax-evasion and leased his General Election HQ to Gerry Adams. On Tonight with Vincent Brown it was reported that SF has now revealed his identity as Hugh Morgan. In February 2011, the Irish Mail on Sunday reported that Morgan plead guilty to fuel smuggling and tax-evasion in 1998, receiving an 18-month suspended sentence, and being required to pay €500,000 in excise duties and €25,000 in Prosecution costs.

SINN Féin president Gerry Adams is renting his election campaign HQ from the family firm of a convicted crossborder fuel smuggler, the Irish Mail on Sunday can reveal.
Festooned with posters of the Dáil hopeful, and flying the tricolour from the second storey, the office – above Gormley’s Pub in Park Street, Dundalk – is in a building belonging to Morgan Fuels Ireland Limited, owned by Hugh Morgan.

Newry businessman Morgan pleaded guilty to fuel smuggling and tax evasion at Belfast Crown Court in June 1998. He received a suspended 18-month jail sentence. He paid £500,000 in excise duties and VAT and was ordered to pay £25,000 prosecution costs.

But when Mr Adams was asked about Mr Morgan’s criminal convictions, he laughed them off, saying: ‘You’re great, great craic.’ He then claimed he didn’t know who Sinn Féin was renting the office space from and said he didn’t know Mr Morgan personally.

He said the lease was ‘a totally bona fide legal contract between Sinn Féin and the owner of the building… sin é, that’s it’.

When asked if Mr Morgan was any relation to departing Louth TD Arthur Morgan, Mr Adams said: ‘I wouldn’t say so,’ and joked: ‘But there’s Morgan’s rum now. It’s spice rum – especially, it’s very nice with Coca-Cola and a twist of lemon.’ Speaking during a canvass in mid-Louth, he then turned to his three aides and asked them: ‘Is Morgan’s Fuel any connection to wee Arthur?’

The revelations threaten to backfire on the McGuinness campaign just as false allegations against Mary Harney in relation to the Flood Tribunal did on Magill Magazine in 2002.

Calls by Wexford TD Mick Wallace (Independent) for the legalisation of adult prostitution predictably provoked the ire of Ruhama. The group is regularly feted in the media – perhaps because of a feminist-perspective that sees the trade as part of the subjugation of the the weak (supposedly women) to the strong dominant male. Labour Women Chair Katherine Dunne has called for the criminalisation of those who hire prostitutes, and the party has cited Ruhama reports to support her case:

Commenting on the Report published by Ruhama, an organisation working with prostitutes, Katherine Dunne, Labour Women Chair said: “We know that the Gardaí are discovering a record number of brothels and that vulnerable women are used in the sex trade. Are we finally ready to admit that we must talk about prostitution and decide how we can tackle this trade which is so harmful to women?

“It is not sufficient to address only the victims of prostitution. Measures must also focus on the responsibility of those who buy women in prostitution, and their strategic role in the chain of both prostitution and trafficking. Prostitution and trafficking are driven by wealth generated by the international trade in women for the sexual entertainment of men through the sexual abuse, degradation and acts of violence against women.

“Men who purchase sex from women and children are an important link in this exploitation chain. Their demand perpetuates this unacceptable situation and therefore has to be tackled.

Perhaps unfairly, she appears to equate adult prostitution and the overall “sex-industry” to child prostitution:

Prostitution and the sex industry promote the myth that male sexuality must be satisfied by a supply of women and children who can be bought. This demands the creation of a group of women who are legitimate targets for rape and sexual exploitation. Male abusers can act with impunity because they know that women in prostitution will not be believed or taken seriously by the criminal justice system. Many abusers deliberately target women’s vulnerabilities, such as a drug habit, in order to act as abusively as they wish.

She also makes the sweeping statement that all women involved in prostitution act under compulsion rather than choice:

“Perhaps the most powerful statement made about prostitution was made by those who were prostitutes themselves: “We, the survivors of prostitution and trafficking gathered at this press conference today, declare that prostitution is violence against women. Women in prostitution do not wake up one day and ‘choose’ to be prostitutes. It is chosen for us by poverty, past sexual abuse, the pimps who take advantage of our vulnerabilities, and the men who buy us for the sex of prostitution.” (Manifesto, Joint CATW-EWL Press Conference, 2005). We should let this statement guide our thinking and our actions.”

For an organisation concerned with the rights of women, it is ironic for Ruhama’s board of trustees to be stacked with representatives of religious orders for so long responsible for the oppression of women in the Magdalene Laundries:

Trustees
Sisters of Our Lady of Charity (O.L.C.)
Good Shepherd Sisters (R.G.S.)
Board of Directors
Chairperson: Mr. Diarmaid O Corrbui
Sr. Sheila Murphy, O.L.C.
Sr. Bernadette Mc Nally, R.G.S.
Dr. Mary Scully
Mr Colm O Dwyer
Ms. Jennie O Reilly
Sr. Frances Robinson, O.L.C
Mr. Peter O Neill (Secretary)
Ms. Valerie Judge
Ms. Rachel Milum

Taxpayer-funding for Ruhama since 2007 has included the following:

2007:

HSE – East Coast Area Health 146,873 143,858
HSE-South Inner City Local Drugs Task Force 57,484 2,282
HSE-South Inner City Local Drugs TF-Emerging Needs 30,721 30,721
Probation & Welfare Service 275,000 275,000
Commission for Support of Victims of Crime 70,000 50,000
Dept of Justice Equality & Law-Human Trafficking 45,980 -
Dept of Social & Family Affairs 2,800 4,601
Total Grants 628,858 556,462
Donations 65,888 145,676
Deposit Interest 3,905 1,363
698,651 703,501

However the debate has not all been one way. For the first time the voices of sex-workers opposed to criminalisation is starting to be heard, in spite of undemocratic and cynical attempts by Ruhama to silence them. The “Sex Workers Alliance Ireland” calls itself “is an alliance of individuals (sex workers, ex-sex workers and other concerned individuals) and organisations involved in health and social support services.” whose mission statement is “To promote the social inclusion, health, safety, civil rights and the right to self determination of female, male and transgender sex workers”. It has emerged that Ruhama has been using Pay Per Click advertising service Google Adwords to reduce the visibility of the “Turn of the Blue Light Campaign” website on the Google search-engine. The role of Ruhama-linked organisations like the Sisters of Charity in the management of the notorious Magdalene Launderies where girls were subjected to decades of terror at the hands of the Church was highlighted recently in a report on Ireland by the United Nations Committee on Torture. To this day the Sisters of Charity has refused to open its archives, making Ruhama’s credibility as a advocate for women’s rights a questionable one.

Estimates put the number of women and girls who passed through the laundries from 1922 to 1996 at 30,000 but the religious orders involved — the Sisters of Mercy, Good Shepherd Sisters, Sisters of Charity and Sisters of Our Lady of Charity — have refused to open their archives.

Originally set up to help prostitutes and women who had babies outside of marriage, the laundries became a dumping ground for unwed mothers and girls whose behaviour was considered promiscuous.

Once referred there, the women were virtually prisoners, had their babies taken away, were abused and forced to work without pay. Many became institutionalised and could never leave. Some remain with the religious orders to this day.

The Establishment’s much-vaunted “Swedish model” of criminalising of clients of prostitutes since 1999 had led – by 2009 – to Sweden having the highest rate of rape in Europe, according to a study by the EU-funded Daphne II Project. It is legitimate to argue if criminalisation of adult prostitution in any form can be to the benefit of women’s rights, if it exposes them to an increased risk of sexual-assault. The country has double the rate of rape of the UK, France and Germany. It that context, arguing that criminalisation of prostitution protects the rights of women represents evolution of irony into farce.

Researchers behind the EU study, which will be presented on Tuesday, conclude that rape appears to be a more common occurrence in Sweden than in continental European countries.

In Sweden, 46 incidents of rape are reported per 100,000 residents.

This figure is double as many as in the UK which reports 23 cases, and four times that of the other Nordic countries, Germany and France. The figure is up to 20 times the figure for certain countries in southern and eastern Europe.

The study, which is financed by the Brussels-based EU fund Daphne II, compared how the respective judicial systems managed rape cases across eleven EU countries. Sweden is shown in an unfavourable light, according to the study.

In the opinion of this writer, there is much to be said for the legalisation and regulation of adult prostitution on both sides of the “transaction” has much to be said for it, on economic, health, and humanitarian grounds. The central arguments for legalisation are as follows:

- Legalisation and registration of brothels takes sex-workers off the streets and out of the arms of the pimp. Inspection of brothels will reduce the incidence of STDs presently resulting from the trade. No longer criminalised, prostitutes will freely report abusive employers to the authorities. Abusive brothel-keepers can be prosecuted and sex-workers will no longer have less fear of reporting them. Licensing of brothels will provide the context whereby those engaged in coercive practices can be closed down, which in itself will incentivise respect for the employment and human rights of sex-workers.

- Legalisation of adult prostitution will reduce incidence of rape in Ireland. This contention is supported by Sweden having the highest incidence of rape in the European Union according to the EU-funded report of the Daphne II group. So the European Union itself is beginning to question criminalisation. The legalisation and taxation of the trade in Germany.

- Prohibition diverts increasingly scarce taxpayer’s money away from more deserving causes, such as schools, hospitals, and the training of Gardai. Is it appropriate that Templemore is forbidden from training a additional Gardai until 2013, so that the State can police the consensual activities of adult Irish citizens?

- Prohibiton is illiberal, and the role of the religious orders in Ruhama underlines that true self-described “Liberals” in the Irish Left such as Labour Women who support it and constantly cite its reports have had the proverbial wool pulled over their eyes. Furthermore, true liberals support the right of all adult citizens to a sex live, regardless of their age, appearance or disability. True liberals support equality. The reality is that some citizens have no option but to pay for sex because of the hand nature has dealt them. In an age where oppression of minorities with inborn characterists such as race, gender, disability and sexual-orientation has become increasingly unacceptable to society, it would be contradictory for a liberal to oppose legalisation of adult prostitution. It is legitimate to ask whether an element of the anti-prostitution lobby is motivated by prejudice against the ugly or the disabled who often have to resort to the services of sex-workers because of societal prejudices.

- Taxation of prostitution would provide considerable revenues to the State. A single brothel in Nevada reportedly has an income of €100,000 per annum – underlining the enormous untapped potential for increasing revenues at a time when the country’s economic policy has effectively been handed to the IMF. In 2006 Der Spiegel highlighted that in Cologne it was “filling Cologne’s coffers” to the tune of hundreds of thousands of euro.

- Legalisation will reduce incidents of rape. In Sweden, 46 incidents of rape are reported per 100,000 residents. This figure is double as many as in the UK which reports 23 cases, and four times that of the other Nordic countries, Germany and France. The figure is up to 20 times the figure for certain countries in southern and eastern Europe.

I rest my case.

1.  The role of preserving “independence” in the herd-lending mentality of banks.  Bank of Ireland, AIB, IL&P and EBS didn’t just chase Anglo and INBS because of profits and targets, they chased them because they thought if they didn’t get bigger themselves (meaning market valuation), it would be too easy for Anglo or a foreign bank to take them over.   And thus one of the great ironies of Ireland’s financial crisis — chief executives and boards wanting to keep the prerogatives of being a stand-alone bank put the banks in the hands of the state.   One outstanding question: did the Irish bank mentality of “independence” affect the thinking of the government in 2008 — the extreme reluctance to get directly involved in managing the bank affairs, preferring instead the stroke of the guarantee?

2.  INBS was a worse financial institution than Anglo.  The shortfalls in how it was run documented in Nyberg are damning.  It was missing even the basic committees that a bank is supposed to have.  Furthermore, the greed driven by its prospective demutualisation was a disastrous force.  The only reason it’s not an even bigger mess is because it didn’t manage to get bigger than it was.   But yes Ireland, things could be worse.  We could have an INBS with an Anglo-sized balance sheet.

3.  A rampant press release culture is an important cameo player in Nyberg.  Brian Cowen, as finance minister, did get briefed on the Central Bank’s Financial Stability Reports.  But the briefing was simply speaking points for the reports — not an analysis of its contents.   The eye was always on the write-up for the hacks, not the key messages for decision-makers.

4.  The Sean Quinn Anglo crisis had a big influence on government thinking.  Far from signalling that something was seriously wrong at Anglo, it created a siege mentality in Anglo and the government … they spent the summer of 2008 thinking “and we would have gotten away with it too if it hadn’t been for those meddling speculators”.   It also just pulled staffing away from preparing for the actual crisis to dealing with the Quinn situation.

5.  The Autumn 2008 Price Waterhouse Coopers was mis-read.  Yes, there was a section saying that banks had enough capital for a stress test.  The Central Bank and Financial Regulator latched onto that and briefed the minister accordingly (see item 3).  But the actual body of the report contained many red flags on how dodgy the balance sheets of these “solvent” banks were.  Someone needed to … read the actual report.

6.  Although Nyberg has the expected hedging paragraphs on the guarantee (on the one hand, on the other hand), overall it’s a damning indictment.  He politely but damningly subtitles that section of his report “Securing Tomorrow”.  Literally — they needed the banks to be able to borrow on interbank markets the next day.  The rest is history.

“Putting the country first may well mean we would be better in opposition, by far….People feel it is going to be hard to drive the government and that, therefore, the people we represent might be better protected by leading the opposition.

“I think there is a strong view along those lines.”

Broughan is the first high-profile TD to publicly oppose a Coalition, though Labour Youth President Colm Lawless Councillor Cian O’Callaghan, Blanchardstown Councillor Patrick Nulty and the UNITE union have also come out against:

“”I’ve been talking to Labour party members across the country, grassroots members, councillors, and I’m also aware that a number of TDs in the party have some strong reservations about the potential for a Fine Gael-led government,” the Howth/Malahide councillor said.

“You can be absolutely certain that you’re going to see a very strong, vigorous and healthy debate on Sunday and we’ll wait to see what the outcome is.” (Cian O’Callaghan)

“I fear that Labour’s influence will be minuscule and that we are about to allow Fine Gael a free reign on introducing harsh austerity measures which will hit ordinary people hardest..I fear that Labour’s influence will be minuscule and that we are about to allow Fine Gael a free reign on introducing harsh austerity measures which will hit ordinary people hardest,” said the Trinity College Dublin student.

“Fine Gael do not rely on Labour to remain in office and this is a serious concern…In the case of not holding a balance of power it is wise for us to remain in opposition.”

Mr O’Callaghan said four TDs had personally expressed their opposition to him about a prospective coalition.

“Unite has campaigned during this general election for a Labour-led left government…We were promoting that our members would vote for the Labour Party; we wanted Eamon Gilmore as taoiseach.” (Jimmy Kelly, UNITE Regional Secretary)

“If a programme for government is put to Labour members, I believe we should reject it and instead put the country first and push for . . . transformation in our political system” (Councillor Patrick Nulty)

“Meanwhile, Labour Party MEP Proinsias De Rossa has said his party should be prepared to go into Opposition.

In a statement, Mr De Rossa said that Labour should defend the interests of its core constituency – low and middle-income earners – by having key elements of its social democratic policies implemented.

He said that if Fine Gael did not accept these requirements, Labour should not enter a Coalition.” (RTE)

Meanwhile, FG’s Immigration and Integration Spokesperson Lucinda Creighton has called for the party to sound out Independent TDs as her supporters were rejecting Labour, “higher taxes” and “going soft on cuts”:

“People voting for me and voting for my colleagues were coming from Fianna Fáil and PD backgrounds. They were voting against Labour and against higher taxes and going soft on cuts. We will be punished if we were to say we would not try to see if there were other viable alternatives”

Creighton’s stance comes amid tensions over the next occupant of the Department of Finance and contrasts with FG Grandees who have largely dismissed a deal with “flakey” Independents. This is in spite of a public offer from Dublin South poll-topper Shane Ross TD for an agreement with up to 8 Independent TDs. Among Independents who might be prepared to support a FG-minority government are Noel Grealish (publicly pledged for vote for Kenny as a “West of Ireland” Taoiseach, former FG TD Michael Lowry, Michael Healy-Rae, former FF TD Tom Fleming, Luke “Ming” Flanagan (who claims to agree with many FG policies), Stephen Donnelly (backed by David McWilliams in Wicklow), former FF TD Mattie McGrath and Shane Ross. Neither of these constitute part of the Leftist-bloc of ULA or SP Independents. An alliance with FG would produce 84 seats and allow FG to reward impressive performers who played a decisive role in shaping policy and building the foundations for the party’s spectacular gains which have made the party – for the first time in Irish political history – the largest in the State. A Coalition with Labour, in constrast, is likely to require the sacrifice of up to 6 Cabinet seats – possibly including the ‘Holy Grail’ of the Department of Finance. With double the seat numbers of Labour, the surrender of the most powerful position at the Cabinet (arguably more so in a Coalition than that of Taoiseach) would raise the spectre of a repeat of the unpopular 1982-7 FG-Labour Government where the senior party was abandoned en masse in the succeeding General Election as conservative and libertarian FG voters defected to the PDs, depriving the party of one-quarter of its vote and consigning it to 22 years (consecutive apart from an interlude in 1992-4) to the political-wilderness.

Any Coalition agreement will have to be ratified by Labour’s Special Delegate Conference and by FG TDs and Senators. Unions will have 10% of the votes while Labour Youth will havd 45 votes at the conference.

While the diverse computer systems and difficulties experienced in retrieving the data are relevant, the failure to accurately summarise these data in tabular form suggests a lack of attention to detail by the bank.

Well, congratulations Irish taxpayer, you’re already invested up to the hilt in this bank — Bank of Ireland – despite its lack of attention to detail.  And that diagnosis in the department’s own report!   Let’s hope their loan book is in better documentary shape than their HR system.   The short version of the report:

 Bank of Ireland has, shall we say, a legally creative interpretation of the word “performance” as in performance-related bonus, and both the Department and Arthur Cox (who did the due diligence report on B of I prior to the previous recapitalization) say they were misled by it.   Yet the fact remains that substantial bonuses were paid out and more are due in 2011.

Consider some other snippets from the report –

As long as the Government operates at arms’ length from the running of the bank, the Department does not have access to the raw data underlying replies to PQs and is reliant on the completeness, accuracy and factual nature of the information provided by the bank.

In other words, because we don’t run the bank, we can’t be expected to know what’s going on there.  Which is the same argument they could make for all the non nationalized banks.  Yet even if the face of that lack of information, they’ve allowed massive fiscal liabilities to pile up in these banks, both through the direct recapitalizations and the liquidity support from the Central Bank and the ECB for which we’re all on the hook.

Note: we wouldn’t have this problem if we’d nationalized the banks.  Brian Lenihan used to like sneering at that proposal but he mightn’t be so confident about that position any more. 

Finally, vis-a-vis the Arthur Cox due diligence, the department is in the strange position of saying that Arthur Cox was effectively misled by Bank of Ireland in putting together that report, but …

Arthur Cox have advised that the due diligence report accurately reported the information made available by the bank and met the report’s agreed scope and materiality thresholds in the context of the €3.5 billion State investment in the bank and the Department accepts that this is the case.

So if the due diligence was just a write-up of information given by the bank, what was its added value?  And note the logic: because the investment is so large, the odd ten million here and there doesn’t matter.  Would any other part of public spending be allowed to escape with such a materiality dodge?