The Special Investigative Commission’s (SIC) report on the banking collapse was the sole item on the agenda in parliament today, and at the time of this writing, half of parliament’s 63 MPs have signed up to speak on the matter.
Many of Iceland’s MPs and ministers have had a busy day, speaking to newspapers, television stations and radio news programs. Perhaps unsurprisingly, many of Iceland’s “outvasion vikings” – venture capitalists who typified the spirit of Iceland’s economic heyday – have not been available for comment.
Margrét Tryggvadóttir, MP for The Movement, criticized the report being on the agenda at all, saying that there is no way anyone had the time to read all 2,300 pages of the SIC report. It was pointed out the report will be discussed again in the future.
Atli Gíslason, an MP for the Leftist-Greens who is also chairman of the committee deciding on what action to take based on the SIC report’s findings – cautioned that parliament needs to be careful when it comes to levying charges against former or current ministers.
“One of the things we have to look at is whether or not ministerial responsibility was involved [in the crash].” he said. “This takes us from the traditional role as a parliamentary committee and to an executive power. There we need to tread very carefully, and take in all possible points of view on the matter.”