Professor Patrick Honohan:

The first time it was communicated in any, sort of, formal way was in ... what date are we talking about, I guess it was 11 November when ... no, it's Friday, 12 November, after the famous discussion in Seoul. But from September, informally, colleagues at the ECB were saying, "Don't you think you should be thinking, don't you think you should be talking to the EFSF people, the IMF?" So there were these informal suggestions, in a collegial way, and I emphasise that. There's a tendency for people to look for demons here and in particular, Jean-Claude Trichet who is a very forceful and definite person, really felt himself to be - and I believe was - a friend to Ireland. When Ireland wasn't doing what he thought they should be doing for their own good, then he got sort of schoolmarmish about it but it was very much ... he felt it was the right thing to do.