Michael Ahern (Cork East, Fianna Fail)

Again, I suspect he deliberately missed the point. We are told groceries cost more here than in the United Kingdom because we have higher input costs such as rents, wages, insurance and so forth. If such costs are higher here, this will be the case regardless of what product one is selling and, as such, any divergence in the rate of inflation between here and the UK should be viewed across all retail sectors.

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