Speaking in the Dáil today Deputy Joan Burton tackled the Táinaiste on proposals to delegate significant functions from the Department of Finance to the National Treasury Management Authority which, by contrast, is a ‘secretive organisation’ which is not subject to Dáil scrutiny or the Freedom of Information Acts.
She demanded to know if this measure was a pre-cursor to full or partial nationalisation of the Irish Banking system – ‘nationalisation for slow learners’.
Legal advice available to the Labour Party suggests that there are serious doubts about the capacity of the Minister for Finance to delegate key functions in regard to banking to the NTMA.
Minister Lenihan, in a statement issued on Tuesday, announced his intention ‘to delegate additional functions in the banking area to the NTMA including
1) Discussions with the covered institutions on their capital needs will be led by the NTMA.
2) Discussions with financial institutions on realignment or restructuring within the banking sector will be led by the NTMA.
3)The management of the Minister’s shareholding in the credit institutions, and
4)Some remaining functions under the guarantee schemes’.
“The National Treasury Management Agency Act 1990 says that the Minister for Finance can by order delegate to the NTMA the functions of the Minister scheduled to the Act, or other functions of the Minister in relation to the management of the national debt or the borrowing of moneys for the Exchequer that the Minister considers appropriate and are specified in the order.
“The scheduled functions relate to the Post Office Savings Bank, savings certificates, prize bonds, borrowing in foreign currencies, payment of debt-free securities- all part of reasonably normal treasury management functions.
“The Labour Party cannot find anywhere else a power of the Minister for Finance to delegate any other of his powers to the NTMA, particularly in relation to the covered institutions. If there is no such power at present, it would have to be dealt with in the Finance Bill, which is to be published later today.
“Under the NAMA Act 2009, the NTMA has the function of providing resources to NAMA, but not much else. In any event, given that a delegated power is one previously vested in the Minister himself, how could, as a matter of ordinary English, the provision of advice on banking matters generally to the Minister, including issues relating to crisis prevention, management and resolution, be considered a delegated function?
“It cannot be a delegated function if it did not previously belong to the Minister and is then transferred downwards by him. Yet there is no Act that confers of the Minister the function of advising himself on the banks.
“This sounds like a completely new function for the NTMA, rather than being a delegated function previously exercised by the Minister.
“The Minister’s statement does not refer to any particular statute that gives him the power to transfer new powers to the NTMA. He says that ‘ draft delegation order is currently being discussed with the Attorney General’s Office’.
“I am now calling on Minister Lenihan to spell out exactly the legal powers which he believes enables him to delegate these functions to NTMA.”