Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I was listening to what was said there. The thing that I really want to get on top of is carbon tax. I know that the ESRI factored that into its analysis, but the cost of living is going up. The weekly shopping is going up as are travel costs. How sustainable is that? I know we say that there are international reasons for the fuel costs going up but fuel costs drive up every other cost. There is a ricochet effect. How will that be dealt with? With carbon tax, it is costing some people more now because they do not have access to public transport. They have no alternative methods of travelling to the car. There does not seem to be any just transition for that. People say that it is only a small fraction of the overall cost of the fuel but fuel is expensive anyway and this is just adding more cost to it. People are paying the carbon tax but they are not realising any of the benefits. How do we approach that?

I want to raise another thing. I do not know if it is in the ESRI's remit. There are discussions around fiscal restraints coming back in from the EU. How does the ESRI see Ireland being positioned with the level of funding and debt that we have in the medium term?

My last question is on interest rates and the cost of borrowing from the point of view of the State and businesses. Does the ESRI see any issues with that? It said Ireland is in a very good position to bounce back and that is probably based on the prudent measures taken since the previous recession. How do we create resilience and build capacity without driving inflation out of control? That is my concern. It is about overheating the economy, in other words.