Professor Patrick Honohan:

So, your last question is "undermining". I think, on the contrary. I think it was ... it created an atmosphere in the negotiations. And, you know, I've been working with people in international organisations all my life, since I was 21. I know the way they work. And the sense that the Administration of the country and the political system was working in a systematic and co-ordinated way, and that there wasn't going to be any messing around, and there was proper communication between all the different parts of government, I think that is what really helped us get a very quick agreement to a programme that, financing aspects aside, worked very well for Ireland - and we fixed the financing aspects later. I think it created a good atmosphere, there was no ramping up of asks from the troika side afterwards. There was no sense of that. And they knew the decisions were going to be taken by politicians.