Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)

That is an interesting intervention but growth in Ireland has been marked down because of failing growth in our customer countries abroad. It is not because of anything in the domestic economy. In fact, the economy in Ireland is positioned to grow and if we got fair weather abroad certainly it would grow strongly. The economy is growing. It grew last year by at least 1%. It continues to grow in the first quarter of this year and as things settle down in Europe I expect there will be stronger growth patterns at the end of the year.

The critics make the connection that the budget targets will be off course because of the down-marking of growth rates. I do not believe this is the case for several reasons. First, our exports are going rather well. Second, the thing had improved at the end of the year beyond what we factored into the budget. The Deputy will remember the budget was worked on a deficit of 10.1% but it will come in for 2011 somewhere between 9.8% or 9.9%. If one thinks of it as a journey, we are a couple of miles up the road towards our destination. Therefore, the situation has improved and there is no reason at present to think we will not reach our fiscal target of a deficit of 8.6% at year end.

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