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

That is not true. On a number of occasions the Deputy has stated his position on these matters. We both agree that the original deal was a bad one. The Government is trying to unwind it by negotiation. As Deputy Dooley pointed out, there are two parts to the negotiations and we are proceeding with them. We are making some progress and we shall see where it works out.

It is also true that Ireland has a deficit problem and a debt problem. Both problems are not entirely separate because the services cost of the debt kicks across into magnifying the deficit problem. Even if there was never a legacy banking issue in Ireland we are still not collecting anything like the amount of revenue that is necessary to run the services on which spending is conducted in Ireland. There is an impression that if we could sort out the legacy banking issue then everything would be resolved but that is not the case. There is an equally difficult position with the deficit and we must close the gap between revenue and expenditure and that is what the budgets are about. I agree with the Deputy that there is a crossover. Obviously, servicing that debt appears in the current account.