Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 10 April 2019

Committee on Budgetary Oversight

ESRI Report on Ireland and Brexit: Discussion

Dr. Adele Bergin:

Deputy Lisa Chambers asked several other questions. She asked how prepared we are for Brexit. To be honest, that is a really tough question to answer. The Government has released various documents on its planning and there has been a widespread information campaign but we do not really know exactly what is going on behind the scenes. It is incredibly challenging for firms and for everyone in general to prepare for something when we do not know what kind of Brexit we will have. As of right now, we cannot even tell people when exactly it will happen. Even if six months ago we had known it was to be the bad case of a no-deal scenario we could have intensified planning during the subsequent six months. Really, the only thing that firms, the Government and everyone can do is to plan for the worst but hope for the best. I hope that answers the question.

Deputy Lisa Chambers asked about foreign direct investment. Under our deal scenario, we assume that the positive impact from foreign direct investment would begin at the end of the transition period, which is not until the end of 2020. In the two no-deal scenarios, we envisage the impact beginning straight away. Again, it is important to state that the overall negative coming from the trade shock far outweighs any positive on the foreign direct investment side.

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