Taoiseach Enda Kenny has said he did not receive a specific briefing from the Central Bank about increasing security at ATMs when the euro crisis was at its worst.
The Fine Gael leader was criticised by the Opposition last week for telling a European People’s Party (EPP) conference in Madrid that Central Bank Governor Patrick Honohan had told him to prepare to deploy the Army.
“The Governor of the Central Bank said to me: ‘It looks like this weekend . . . you’ll have to put [THE]Army around the banks and around the ATM machines and introduce capital controls like they had in Cyprus’,” he told the conference.
However, speaking at the launch of Fine Gael’s online tax calculator for Budget 2016 on Wednesday, Mr Kenny suggested the proposal had been discussed by a Government taskforce which involved the Central Bank.
“I was invited by the EPP to give them a sort of a chronological run-down of the situation that applied in Ireland and the decisions that the Government of Fine Gael and Labour had to make to rescue our economy, fix our finances and put the people back to work,” he said.
Mr Kenny said the possibility of a break-up of the Euro currency was being discussed across Europe from the moment he was elected Taoiseach in 2011.
“The Government did set up a taskforce comprised of a number of Departments and agencies of which the Department of Finance, the Taoiseach, the Central Bank and so on were involved,” he said.
“They considered all of these contingencies and clearly as was pointed out to you by the Minister for Finance [Michael Noonan] the question of security in the event of a break-up of the euro currency was one that was considered.”
Mr Noonan last week said the Economic Management Council (EMC) discussed what might be done if ATMs ran out of money. The EMC comprise Mr Kenny, Mr Noonan, Tánaiste Joan Burton and Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Brendan Howlin.
Mr Kenny’s account delivered in Madrid was dismissed as a “fairy tale” by Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin.
Asked on Wednesday if he had received a specific briefing from the Central Bank to the effect that he might have to deploy the army, Mr Kenny said: “No, not specific, no.”
Asked if he regretted his Madrid remarks, he said: “I’ve tried to explain that when the taskforce was set up they had to consider all of the contingencies or possible options that might happen because there was a very serious situation arising right across Europe and there was a lot of talk within different Governments and so on that there might be an end to the euro currency per se.”
