Eoghan Murphy (Dublin South East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

In his opening statement, Professor FitzGerald said, "The dangers the economy faced as a result of the over-inflation of house prices, the build-up of debt and the loss of competitiveness in the economy were foreseeable and [as set out in the appendix] foreseen." The appendix contains the implications for fiscal policy of the analysis in the ESRI quarterly economic commentary and the medium-term review in the period 2001 to 2008. He contends that the dangers the economy faced were foreseen by the ESRI and published over the period. Am I correct that Professor FitzGerald conveyed some of his warnings to the European Commission and the IMF and asked them to intervene with the Government, and they said they could not?