ENDA KENNY HAS been described as “a crawler” by Sinn Féin’s Mary Lou McDonald after he said he cannot force the president of the European Central Bank to appear before the banking inquiry.

However, the Taoiseach said that he would ask Mario Draghi to attend the inquiry and later confirmed he intends to raise the issue with the ECB chief at the European Council meeting in Brussels tomorrow.

The issue was raised at Leaders’ Questions after the Draghi wrote to the inquiry, which held its first public hearings today, explaining that the bank “does not see itself in a position to participate in inquiries conducted by national parliaments”.

McDonald accused Draghi and the ECB of “an arrogant disregard for this State and our people” and asked Kenny if he had challenged Draghi on his “refusal to cooperate”.

Kenny said that Draghi is “more than competent to attend at this banking inquiry or any other” but said he could not force the Italian banker to do so.

In response, McDonald said Kenny was “a crawler”:

“You are a crawler, that you are not prepared to call that very institution to account. You say that they’re not obliged to attend, you say, however, that they should attend,” she told the Dáil.

With government TDs visibly outraged at McDonald’s remarks Kenny responded: “If she speaks about crawling, I could remind her of a few things very quickly but I won’t do so here.”

Kenny repeated that Draghi would be “more than competent” to attend the inquiry but said that he had not spoken to him or asked him to attend.

As TDs asked across the chamber if Kenny would ask Draghi to come before the Oireachtas committee, the Taoiseach responded: “Of course I’ll ask him.”

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