DAIL REPORT: The Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, said he did not understand how former senior bank executives did not know how they had become implicated in the current controversies.
He was replying to the Labour leader, Mr Pat Rabbitte, who asked: "Does the Taoiseach agree that it beggars belief that the most senior executives in the bank should profess to know nothing of how they became implicated in these affairs? How can that make sense to the average person?"
The Taoiseach replied: "Regarding the deputy's first question as to how people at the very top in these institutions could be involved without knowing anything about it, I do not understand that and I find it hard to believe it."
Mr Rabbitte said: "Mr Roy Douglas, for example, seems to implicate the bank as an institution when he says that when he climbed the corporate ladder he was invited to participate in this scheme.
"He makes it sound like he was being offered the key to the executive loo, that this was just a perk of the job that came when he achieved high office."
Mr Rabbitte said people did not believe they were equal before the law.
"The window cleaner who had a part-time job, and was drawing social welfare, is screwed to the ground until he pays back the social welfare, even if he is only employed on a part-time basis. That does not apply here."
Mr Joe Higgins (Socialist Party, Dublin West) said that for very many working people in the State, the revelations about the "massive fraud and tax evasion in the banking system, and the air of injured innocence of the most senior people involved might come from a Monty Python script".
Mr Ahern said the issues involved should not be treated in a lighthearted manner. "The result of doing so is that they are not taken seriously. These are serious matters."
The Fine Gael leader, Mr Enda Kenny, said that in recent weeks the people's confidence in banks, especially Allied Irish Banks, had been rocked.
"We have experienced a drip-feed of stories involving overcharging, dodgy dealing and tax evasion."
He asked how the plain people and the business people of Ireland have confidence that this would be the last scandal to hit the bank. "The culture which spawned this, one of greed and low standards which these scandals now reveal, is reminiscent of the culture that permeated Fianna Fáil in government many years ago." He asked the Taoiseach to give assurances that "this culture of sleaze and greed" would be eradicated from the banking sector once and for all.
"Is the Taoiseach satisfied that the regulatory bodies involved have the capacity to restore confidence to consumers and to the international community so that everybody will understand that we will put an end to this? If it happened elsewhere, people would be in handcuffs and being interviewed."
Mr Ahern said he had already stated that he believed customers must be recompensed, systems must be fixed and all the regulatory authorities informed.
"I want disciplinary matters pursued in regard to any offences committed," he said.
He added that IFSRA was determined that the highest standards must apply in financial institutions.
"If issues of general culture or compliance practice need to be investigated and corrected in any other institution, this will also have to be done."
Mr Kenny suggested that the "last semblance of hope" came from the chairman of AIB, Mr Dermot Gleeson, whom he had always found to be a man of integrity when working with him in government.
Mr Ahern said Mr Gleeson and previous holders of his position were people of outstanding probity and credibility who did their best to ensure those things did not happen.
"Unfortunately, people do not do what we expect them to do within the normal standards of business."
Later, responding to a private notice question from Mr Dan Boyle (Green Party, Cork South Central) the Minister of State for Health and Children, Mr Brian Lenihan, said that under new legislation individuals might be subjected to penalties. A senior manager might be disqualified from employment at management level in the financial services sector and a penalty of up to €500,000 might be applied.