Ms Ann Nolan:

I think ... I mean, I would've been aware that somebody had mentioned it and ... probably by May anyway, that year. And I don't think I remember having a conversation with Patrick about it particularly. I think we were looking at how it could or couldn't be avoided and whether it should or shouldn't be avoided because there's two aspects to that. At a certain point of stress, you might be better off in a programme, you know, provided you could control what the programme was forcing you to do. In other words ... and certainly by that August we were working in the Department very much on the national recovery plan, the four-year plan, because we wanted to make sure that if we entered into negotiations, that we had a version up front, ourselves, of what we wanted out of them. In other words, that we weren't in a position where the IMF was coming in and making it up ab initio.