Mr. Brian Cowen:

Well to be less reliant on transactional tax revenues we would have had to increase income tax, had more people paying tax at perhaps higher rates. The purpose of the personal taxation policies was to maximise employment opportunity for people and by keeping personal taxes low, maximise employment. I think we had got to a very good position on employment, an historically high position. But looking back now, I think Regling and Watson have outlined a number of issues that need to be addressed for the future. And as I say there was no budgetary strategy, however prudent, that could have avoided a major adjustment, given the scale of the crash that happened.