Mr. John Palmer:

As regards the stability programme update at the end of April, the Department's forecast, which was endorsed by the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council, was that real gross domestic product, GDP, growth would be 4.9% in 2016 and would trend downwards towards the 3% mark as we move out towards 2020. Growth in nominal GDP, which is when one puts on the price effects of the GDP deflator, is expected to be approximately 7.6% this year and to trend down to just over 4% in 2021. The nominal figure is important because nominal growth in GDP is what gives us the denominator for the calculation of the debt-to-GDP ratio.