Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Okay. Final question is, you say in your witness statement that during the pre-crisis years in Ireland, strong economic growth masked important imbalances in several key areas of the economy, including housing, banking sector and the public finances and I don't think there is any disputing that. But can I put it to you, Mr. Buti, that the agreed measure at the time of the structural deficit for example of member states, that Ireland even then was reporting positive structural balances, I think, bar one year? And when we had testimony here by John McCarthy, the chief economist in the Department of Finance, he stated that the measurement of structural deficits is still a problem today. And he confirmed, when I put it to him are you saying that Ireland was actually complying with the structural balance requirements from Europe at the time, pre-crisis, in accordance with how the structural balance was measured in harmonised terms during all of those years, he said, "Yes". So in acknowledging that imbalances were building up in the system, the agreed harmonised methodology for measuring that in the EU did not detect those imbalances on the fiscal side. Can you comment on that?