Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 17 October 2012

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform

2013 Allocations for Public Expenditure - Finance Vote Group: Discussion with Minister for Finance

2:45 pm

Photo of Michael NoonanMichael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The range below €1 billion goes from 1 billion down to one. The Deputy should not assume we will go for either one half or three quarters or anything like that. If it is helpful to the Deputy, I made the remark that the figure of €1 billion is high and we have no intention of the yield on the property tax being €1 billion. That is what I said.

I will supply the Deputy with the GNP figure. There are a few figures here that are not straight off the Estimates so I do not want to have a punt on it. I want to give him the exact figure.

In respect of the date of 2015, the original programme as negotiated by the Fianna Fáil-Green Party Government was that the adjustment would be made by 2014. In the first round of renegotiation, the incoming Government in May 2011 got that extended by one year. We have already got the extension. Portugal got an extra year in the summer and Greece is looking for an extra two years. We got the year that we negotiated and we feel we are well on target to get the deficit below 3% by 2015, so we are not looking for an extension of time on that.

There has been much discussion of the promissory note. It was an arrangement entered into by the Fianna Fáil-Green Party Government. It is a promissory note that I promised to pay. I could write one out for the Deputy. It is a strange arrangement.

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