Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Irish Fiscal Advisory Council definitely did not pull its punches in its recent assessment of the Government's projections and stability programme update. The report includes a reference to projections being "poorly founded", and uses language such as "piecemeal", "not realistic", "not credible" and "not ... useful". In fairness to the Minister, he did not pull his punches either, rebuking the assessment and defending the Government's approach. What is the next step for IFAC? The Minister, in his commentary yesterday, did not appear to take the criticisms on board.