Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

I can see that point. I have a question to follow on from that. What particular sectors will be hurt? Could the witnesses be a bit more specific? The chemicals industry was mentioned. The graphs showing the contribution chemical exports have made to export growth are quite stunning. The graph shows that without increased chemical exports our exports would be negative, which is a pretty stark indication of the reliance on one particular sector. I presume another sector that has contributed very significantly to our growth over recent years is the IT sector. I do not see either of those being significantly impacted by Brexit one way or another. The Central Bank's representatives' commentary suggests that most export growth goes to the United States and, interestingly, Belgium. The IT sector will not be significantly impacted. If I understood what Dr. Cassidy said about financial services, there could be a positive spin-off for us if anything. There is no particular negative impact there. Where will the negative impacts be? I presume they will be felt in agribusiness because of the huge portion of agricultural output that is exported to Britain. I imagine tourism will be hit. I would be interested to hear the witnesses' comments on that. To what extent does the Central Bank's analysis take these swings and roundabouts into account?

Does this Brexit crisis not highlight much more deep-rooted structural weaknesses in the economy that need to be addressed no matter what happens, regardless of whether there is a soft or hard Brexit? One such weakness is that we are considerably over-reliant on a few sectors. If problems emerge in any of them, the economy will be in serious trouble. If this is true, what should we be doing about it? Diversification is what is needed. Do our guests believe that Ireland is moving to take serious steps to diversify its economy or is industrial policy concentrated on growing the sectors on which we rely and potentially increasing our vulnerability in the medium to long term?