Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 7 July 2020

Special Committee on Covid-19 Response

Impact of Covid-19: Overall Fiscal and Monetary Position

Mr. Gabriel Makhlouf:

I will not comment on the quantum because we have given a sense of the range in terms of the liquidity challenge. The Government will have to think about the trade-offs it will be making between the various areas that it will be thinking about. It will obviously have to be sizeable to create the sort of space for the decisions that I have talked about.

I do not think targeting is easy, but I do think targeting matters in that it enables one potentially to allocate more resources to particular sectors, but as I just said, the target needs to be to try and find those viable businesses and avoid them becoming insolvent. For me, that is the main immediate issue. I do not know whether Dr. Cassidy wishes to add anything to that.