Dr. Eddie Casey:

The lesson is also important for construction, in particular. This links to the Deputy's earlier question, related to how we solve what is an intractable problem. One problem is the number of workers. When the 2008 financial crisis hit, we lost about two thirds of the workers in construction through migration and other means. They left and went into other sectors, which means the killing of capacity. If public investment could be maintained in a recession like that – it was slashed in half after 2008 – it might be possible to keep the capacity. This was one of the big lessons from the financial crisis. It cast a massive shadow. Capacity was gone for a very long time and we were not able to ramp up when we needed more housing. Additionally, there are other effects. We know the Irish construction sector is one of the least productive by comparison with the world’s top performers. With regard to the numbers of units built per hour worked, our level of productivity is about half of that elsewhere. One reason is that if there is less certainty in the sector, fewer people invest in training and new technologies. These need certainty to thrive. Looking forward, you would like to see that certainty spanning out over a much longer horizon rather than having the boom to bust Mr. Coffey described.