Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Does IFAC have any advice for the Dáil or the Government as to how extra spending should be targeted in the context of a very difficult Brexit? During the previous crisis, Germany spent a great deal of money on direct subsidies to employers aimed at allowing them to retain employees. Everybody referenced, three or four times, the fact that a lot of unemployment could be expected. This would result in people in our system shifting to social welfare. Does IFAC see scope for us to use the German system? I know it can be referred to as underemployment, under-activity and so on, but Germany did a lot better than Ireland. The old East Germany, which was not as economically dynamic as the old West Germany, also consistently did a lot better in trying to maintain firms, rather than allowing them to crash, by using, in an appropriate way, subsidies that had to be used to maintain people in employment.