Mr. Sebastian Barnes:

The Deputy is right that the current position is putting considerable pressure on firms. As we have said, one of the things that could put us into the severe scenario is that the pressure on firms is bigger than the Government has anticipated and is covered by our central scenario, or if the policy response is less effective than anticipated. I am not in a position to assess that and it will depend on what happens in the coming months. It is interesting to hear what the Deputy is saying in that context.

One thing to be made clear is that once the confinement measures are lifted, although things will not return to normal in any sense, the economy will pick up. People will be able to go back to work once they have their kids in school. A lot of activity will naturally pick up and we might see quite a strong growth rate next year but it will not be anywhere near enough to fill the gap in demand and unemployment will remain high.

It is not that we are not going to see any growth, it is just that things will remain far below the level they used to be at for quite a while.

On the comparison with the previous crisis, Ireland went into that with an overheated housing market, people were very stretched on the credit side, Government revenues turned out to be very fragile and the banking system became very distressed. We know that whenever that happens, one ends up with a very deep, lasting, and nasty recession. In this case, the public finances and the banks are going into it in better shape and the European reaction has been much more timely and effective. These give reasons for hope, even though I appreciate that for some of the Deputy's constituents, it is proving very hard to see that today.