Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein)

We have seen previous forecasts for growth rates last year and this year which were totally off the mark. We might be advised to take the current forecast of modest growth in the economy in the coming years with a grain of salt. Again, this will be determined by budgets and whatever proposal the Minister for Finance brings to the House on Tuesday. I think that prediction of modest growth over the next few years is far off the mark. There is a connection, of course, with the fact that people's incomes are in decline with a resulting decrease in domestic demand. There is a continuing stagnation of local economies in many areas, with shops and factories closed and accompanying dereliction. Except for the welcome increase in exports I do not see any proposals for getting local economies back to work. If the Government continues with austerity measures there will be fewer pennies in people's pockets. A drop in spending will result in local shops and companies being put into receivership. To date, we have not seen evidence of the major steps which are required. Some may be planned for the future but the urgency is not evident. I acknowledge the Government has only been in place for a few months but some of its decisions thus far are not in tune with what I believe is required to be done.

One does not need to be a Nobel laureate in economics to realise that if billions of euro is taken out of people's pockets, the economy will be further depressed. People must be encouraged to release their savings. I do not blame people for saving their money but money must be spent for an economy to be active. It is a scandalous fact that significant sums of money - I do not have the figure to hand but it may be two trillion or three trillion euro - in Irish pension and investment funds are invested abroad.

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