Jonathan O'Brien (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I can address the other issues later. I am developing a bit of understanding from the meeting that we are probably looking at two separate issues. The Minister said that his preference would be a countercyclical approach. The language is important because if we are looking at approximately €500 million, that is not really countercyclical. The Minister would agree with that. We are looking at two separate issues. If that is the case, we will need two separate types of withdrawal criteria. If there is a countercyclical rainy day fund and withdrawal criteria set out in primary legislation, then will annual events such as flooding - which is becoming an annual event - be suitable for a rainy day fund or for the emergency contingency fund? I know the Minister is open to all this at the moment. Is he looking at two different funds right now? Would that be the preference of the Department? I think he has already said that primary legislation would be needed for a counter-cyclical rainy day fund, but I would see difficulty in putting a contingency fund into primary legislation because one would want to access it quickly if it was something like foot and mouth disease or a flooding event. One would not want to spend three weeks trying to get permission through the Houses of the Oireachtas. Will the Minister make that clear? On the actual funding of the rainy day fund, if there are two separate issues, the €500 million would, to me, be the short-term immediate contingency fund. How will we fund the longer-term model? I know the Minister said that one might be looking at such things as once-off gains to the Exchequer, maybe tax surpluses. In that case, is it not very hard to define how quickly we could actually establish a rainy day fund of €20 billion? We do not know what once-off gains to the Exchequer could be coming down the road or what tax surpluses may or may not happen. Will the Minister give us some insight into his thinking on that?