Mr. Derek Moran:

On forecasting, the overall tax takes came in on or just ahead of the forecast. In terms of the numbers, if they fall within an estimated forecasting margin of 1% or 2%, the numbers either side of that are quite big. Can we be happy with the figures, and particularly the March performance? No, we cannot. It is a cautionary note. This is not a good performance and we have to scrutinise that as we go forward. We have spoken about income tax and corporation tax. The Deputy may recall that last year we had a very big surge in excise because the tobacco industry was taking stuff out of bonds in advance of the introduction of plain packaging, which ultimately did not happen, and we got a very big uplift in receipts in that year. There is a distortionary effect in that which makes both the year on year forecasting and the profiling quite difficult.