Sinn Féin Finance Spokesperson Pearse Doherty TD has said that the new Government plan to tackle white collar crime “won’t see any white collar criminals losing any sleep.”
The Departments of Justice, Finance, and Business Enterprise and Innovation have collaborated to publish a list of twenty-eight actions with the goal of combating white collar crime, as well as the introduction of an anti-corruption bill.
The Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement has also been declared as an independent agency.
Deputy Doherty says that this plan however, will fail to deliver the cultural and legal change required.
Deputy Doherty said: “This cut and paste job from a government whose Programme didn’t even mention white collar crime, we won’t see any white collar criminals losing any sleep.
“I can only presume it’s meant to be some sort of response to the tracker mortgage scandal but there is nothing in the plan that would make any of the bankers responsible for the scandal any more accountable.
“Likewise, the plan includes looking at the Banking Inquiry recommendations but they are weak and arrived at through a very narrow legal focus.
“The plan simply would not have prevented the banking crash or even seen any more of its perpetrators held accountable in a Court.
“The issue of reckless lending is not mentioned, there is nothing about individuality accountability and even issues raised by the Central Bank like the need for a new offence of giving misleading information to the Central Bank are not addressed. Class Action suits are not mentioned despite the obvious need for them in light of the tracker scandal.
“In short, the plan is a flop. It will not bring about the cultural and legal changes the State needs.
“This cut and paste job is a scrambled together photo-op for four Ministers; it is not a serious attempt at radical reform.
“The government has shirked the responsibility of doing the hard work, the forensic analysis of what is required. The first five actions all relate to one piece of legislation while others are about implementing EU directives already overdue or responding to international moves as we are obliged to do.
“After today, I am more convinced than ever before that this government does not have the political will to do the hard work on this issue. The tracker scandal has forced them to cobble together a report but it fails far short of what is needed.”
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