Darragh O'Brien (Dublin North, Fianna Fail)

The bottom line is that the Government faces major difficulties regarding the banking crisis. Today has brought closure and finality to that because there is certainty as to how that is being dealt with. Regarding the real economy, at every stage the parties opposite try to talk down the good work being done by our citizens. Some 1.9 million people are working in the country. In 2009, we brought in €19 billion in foreign direct investment, which equates to half of what the entire United Kingdom brought in. It brought in just short of €40 billion and we brought in €19 billion. Ireland is a good place to do business and unlike my colleagues on the other side of the House, I am very positive about the country's prospects for next year. Projections from many sources have been positive about our economic outlook including a recent Morgan Stanley report, published on 13 September, Peter Sutherland and the European Commissioner for Economic and Monetary Affairs, Olli Rehn.

We had to be upfront in dealing with the banking crisis. If we had taken Deputy O'Donnell and his colleagues' approach of allowing the banks themselves to write down their debt, we would be still here in ten years time trying to figure it out.

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