Professor Patrick Honohan:

And that's why I think Jean-Claude Trichet said to the group, you know, when you were in the Royal Hospital, he was saying, "I only gave advice." Yes, but you see he has to stay within his mandate. It's advice, it's saying, "I'm operating a system here where we are absolutely on the limit of what we can lend you and so it's my responsibility to tell you that you're at the limit, so you better go in." Now, then he gives helpful advice about the measures that should be taken in the programme which, I think, those too are gratuitous. But that's what central bankers do all the time to governments, they tell them, you know, "You should have a better budget and it should be like this." I try to avoid doing that, you know, expect for when I really am being helpful. But it would have been standard behaviour of a central banker, and he was a national central banker before he was a European central banker so, it wouldn't have been very surprising. Though when it comes it three years later it looks a bit odd. You say, "Well, how does that sit with your mandate?" I think it, sort of, sits with the mandate.

He's not actually threatening, he's just saying, "Here's the situation. We're at our limit. We're at the situation where we are placing our legitimacy at risk by extending ever-increasing amounts of ELA." Should it have been a deadline ultimatum? No.