Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)

There is deep concern about the eurozone crisis almost on a daily basis, given recent events. There are significant concerns about Greece and its political uncertainty, Spain and Italy, with bond yields rising again. The markets are reacting negatively in a significant way to these events and confidence is being undermined day by day. There is concern about the adequacy of the firewall and if it will be sufficient to curb this crisis. This has been labelled a great recession, the worst we have experienced since the late 1920s, and the eurozone crisis is turning out to be prolonged, with no sign of abatement any time soon. President Hollande of France will meet Chancellor Merkel of Germany this evening, and that represents an opportunity to try to turn this around.

Does the Taoiseach agree that now is the time for Europe to take radical and urgent action? It should be radical in the sense that the European Central Bank should have the mandate to support growth in all its aspects and not just singularly focus on inflation. European funding, whether through reallocation of structured funds or new funding, must be provided to countries with high debt, a raised risk and elevated unemployment, as a true fiscal Union would envisage. We need a massively expanded European Investment Bank to support infrastructural projects that can increase productivity and create jobs on the ground. Does the Taoiseach accept these radical steps are now urgently required to ensure a restoration of confidence across eurozone countries and that we can once and for all deal decisively with the issues that have hampered Europe's capacity to recover in recent years?

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