Mr. Sebastian Barnes:

Although Professor McHale did not speak directly on that point, he referred to the fiscal situation in the near term. We have primarily been focusing on 2015 as the deadline, but we hope the world will continue after that time. Ireland will continue to have a high level of debt. That could be a risk, as there could be new shocks and Ireland would need to face them with only small margins. A great deal of the evidence that economists examine suggests that high public debt has an impact on growth. It is important that we move beyond having such a debt. Fairness is also an issue. How much do we want to push onto younger people? Significant questions remain and it is clear that debt needs to reduce. As our report showed, additional consolidation will be required.

In this regard, we began to discuss an important context in the report, namely, Ireland's new fiscal rules, which will be introduced under the fiscal responsibility legislation and our European commitments. Those rules apply a debt target of 60%. There is nothing magic about that number; it just happens to be the one we signed up to. This is an important context in the medium term. By increasing the sustainability of the public finances and future stability, that framework and many other measures will hopefully allow us to avoid returning to our current position. In principle, macroeconomic stability should be good, and we know that can be incredibly damaging to small businesses and the functioning of the real economy, but reaching that point from where we are today will be difficult.