Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

When we talk about the need to bring order to our public finances, which everybody agrees we must, the record will show that the Opposition agreed with that proposition in principle but opposed it in practice.

In the present context the four cornerstones of any policy needed to help deal with this situation, are, bringing order to our public finances, trying to get our banks to operate in a functioning manner in support of business and the wider economy, seeking to maintain employment and secure the maximum level of employment we can in this very difficult economic situation and protecting and upskilling those who lose their jobs. I do not believe anybody disagrees with that. That is the approach the Government is trying to take in respect of all these matters.

At this point we cannot give the Opposition a definite outline of how the full year picture will emerge, only to say, based on present trends, how we believe it will be. Every government is facing that dilemma and predicament. This is not a static situation. An economic convulsion is taking place in the world economy, as everybody knows. This country is not and will not be immune from that problem. A small open economy such as ours faces even greater turbulence than others because we do not have a domestic market that will consume some of the goods we produce.

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