Mr. Vasileios Madouros:

I will say a few broad things about tariffs and then I will discuss projections. I will focus more on Ireland than on an aggregate, euro area-wide level.

Economists do not agree on much but they agree that tariffs hurt everyone. Tariffs are costly in terms of reducing trade and have implications for the productive capacity of the global economy. For an open economy like ours, which has a big reliance on global trade, tariffs and their implications for global trade are particularly relevant.

As we have said, we do not yet know where tariffs might ultimately land. As I mentioned in my opening statement, as part of our quarterly bulletin we set out different scenarios around what the tariffs might be to get a sense of their impact on the domestic economy. Our baseline scenario assumes that US tariffs on imports from the EU, including Ireland, will be 20%, which is the level post the expiry of the reciprocal tariff pause. There would be exemptions, as there are at the moment, for key sectors, including pharmaceuticals. The adverse scenario assumes that the tariffs will be 20% for all sectors, including pharmaceuticals, which is relevant for Ireland given the nature of our exports, and that the EU retaliates with 20% tariffs. These are the assumptions that underpin the two scenarios. The second scenario has a bigger impact on economic activity. Another relevant point is that if the tariffs are permanent, they will have a permanent and persistent impact on the economy.

We do not know where the tariffs are going to land. What we do know is that uncertainly has been very high, which is evident in the discourse and in different measures. Uncertainty, in and of itself, hurts economic activity, potential investment and potential new employment, which is incorporated in our projections at different levels.

The second thing I will say on tariffs is that while there is uncertainty about where they might land, there is also a degree of uncertainty about their economic effect. We have not seen, at the global level, an increase in tariffs to the potential level we might get to at a time when the global economy has been so integrated. There is uncertainty about what the economic effects of tariffs might be. I am happy to go into some of these things but I just wanted to give the Deputy a bit of a sense of the uncertainty around it. Does anyone want to add anything?