Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Well, I suppose, there is always a human factor and it depends who the Minister is and who the Government are, but in terms of the legal position, yes. And the legal position is straightforward now. And it would be wrong to think that it's fiscal rules that are European fiscal rules imposed on Ireland and that we wouldn’t obey them if we thought we'd get away with it. I mean, we took ownership of the rules when we put the referendum through. And I argued for the rules in the negotiations in Brussels and I'd be very strongly committed. We ... there are a lot of rules there but to latch on to the point you made about counter-cyclical economic policy, that's certainly built into the rules now. There may be refinements in them as, you know, practice plays out but I think they're very good and I think they're a major bulwark against we getting back into a crisis situation again. But the other bulwark of course is not to rely on one sector of the economy - relying on just building and development and using that for your transactional taxes. If you look at the last jobs figures, 12 sectors in Ireland have put on jobs. I think CSO divides the economy into 14 and the two that didn’t put on jobs were the public sector, where it's the policy anyway to keep jobs growth down, you know.