Proposals for the appointment of an independent financial regulator are to come before the Government shortly, the Tanaiste announced. Ms Harney said that they would be submitted by her and the Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy.
Agreeing to opposition demands for a debate on the Magill revelations relating to Allied Irish Banks, Ms Harney said: "The Government is concerned about the regulatory regime applying to the financial services sector, where it seems to me there is an over-concern with monetary and prudential matters to the detriment of everything else."
Mr Joe Higgins (Socialist Party, Dublin West) said: "What we are talking about is the blind robbery of the taxpayer by the rich."
Ms Harney said that the Revenue Commissioners were independent in the exercise of their functions. She added that the particular settlement referred to in recent days was done under the regime of a different government.
Mr John Gormley (Green Party, Dublin South East) said that the House was confronted almost weekly with financial scandals and stories of fraud. Was it the Government's intention to speed up the publication of the Fraud Offences Bill?
Replying that the Bill would be ready in the first half of next year, Ms Harney said she shared Mr Gormley's concern. "It seems that what has been emerging recently about events in the 1980s and 1990s shows a society seriously dysfunctional."