Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

I accept that we have seen increased unemployment in net terms. That happens in recessions. The Deputy's party was in Government during recessions, even though he may not have been. The only way we can recover is by improving our competitiveness and getting back into the marketplace to create the goods and services and create the jobs at home. We are pursuing policies that are seeing improvements in our competitiveness.

There has been no support from the other side of the House for what we are doing. Can the Deputy give me one Government initiative that has been supported by his party? He agrees with the objective that expenditure must be reduced, but when it comes to voting on individual items of expenditure, he opposes them. That is fair enough because that is the role of the Opposition. In the meantime, the Government will continue to pursue policies that will bring growth back to this economy, hopefully in the second half of this year.

We are more seriously affected by other countries, because we are a small open economy and our fortunes are very much determined by what happens in the world economy. We must make sure that when the world economy lifts, we are positioned to reap the benefits. The volatility in interest rates affected our exporters' ability to maintain markets, especially in the US and the UK. That is changing as well. We are pursuing policies that will bring about recovery and growth.

See this speech in context