Gilmore: Govt does not intend to use taxes to fund banks

The Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore has said the Government does not intend to put any more taxpayers' money into Irish banks.

Mr Gilmore was responding to remarks made by the Financial Regulator Mathew Elderfield.

He told a German newspaper that Irish banks would need between €3bn and €4bn extra to meet new capital requirements.

However, speaking in his constituency in Shankill this morning, where he was voting in the EU Fiscal Treaty referendum, the Tánaiste said the Government does not intend to use any more taxpayers money to fund bank recapitalisation.

Mr Gilmore said: "No we don't want to do that."

"What we want is the banks to improve and be successful, and Mr Elderfield, as I understand it, is talking about the situation a number of years down the road as the banks improve and as they move out of the state they have been in, so this is not about taxpayers' money."