Professor Alan Ahearne:

I had mentioned in my statement about the fiscal consolidation. I mean, at the ... when ... I remember in 2009, there was a lot of arguments about ... the Government surely should be putting money into the economy not taking it out. I think that was a misunderstanding of the nature of the deficit. As I mentioned in the statement, it was a structural deficit. I mean ... and I said a few times in the statement if the work that was done over that period had not been done, the Irish economy would not be growing at 5% this year. I think that's ... to me, that's absolutely clear and, therefore, in his work, he set the groundwork for the recovery that would follow.