Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein)

The Minister stated that we need to send out a confident message. In regard to his statement that other contributions are a recipe for depression, I am sure he is aware of a former Taoiseach who also dismissed with the same type of words claims by others that the economic policies that the then Government were pursuing were not the right ones and would lead us into depression. The Minister should be careful when others point up the pitfalls in Government strategy.

The pact for the euro deals with a debt sustainability model. Anyone who taps into the ESM post-2013 will be subject to debt sustainability analysis by the EU-IMF. If a state is deemed insolvent debt restructuring must follow. The European Commission has carried out a debt sustainability analysis for this country. However, its data was off the mark. Three issues arise. Has this come up at the European Council meeting? Are we asking for a new debt sustainability based on the fact that our GDP growth rate has been slashed to almost one-quarter of what the Government projected or half of that predicted by the EU-IMF? Our unemployment average for this year is estimated to be 405,000. It is currently running at approximately 441,000 people. We have committed to putting €24 billion into the four guaranteed institutions. However, the stress tests on Irish Nationwide Building Society and Anglo Irish Bank show that the Government may need to inject further billions into the banks. The big issues are debt sustainability and how we can afford this debt.

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