From left: Simon Harris, then a junior minister; Michael Noonan, Minister for Finance; Frank Daly, then Nama chairman; Brendan Howlin, then Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform; and Brendan McDonagh, chief executive of Nama, at the 2015 launch of Nama's docklands and residential funding plan at the Aviva Stadium. Photograph: Cyril Byrne
Nama controlled pretty much every bit of development land in the country. Not only that, but it had an iron grip over the country’s property developers and the backing of the Department of Finance and the Dáil. if the last crash taught us one thing, it is that nobody really knows what will happen when the music stops
In this context, the absolute priority for Nama was to repay the money it had borrowed, the idea that it would use its unparalleled power to restructure the property market and ensure that there was no repeat of the speculative bubble that led to its creation was not on the agenda. Nama’s commercial mandate has played its part in many of the policy mistakes that have been made since. Initiatives to encourage overseas investors, such as the tax breaks on build-to-let developments, are just one example.
It is easy with hindsight to home in on the failure of Nama and, by extension, the government to take a long-term strategic approach that would have put the supply of cheap building land at its centre.