Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

That was hardly a question at all. The Deputy is living in a dream world. We experienced an extraordinary economic shock of incredible proportions when 16% of our employment was wiped out. We are, however, stabilising that. While the Deputy refers to a 33,000 job loss, only 3,000 of those were in the private sector. The sectors we need to grow for the future are stabilising. Unfortunately, we must reduce the size of the public sector and that continues to be a pressure as we seek to stabilise and restore our public finances.

With regard to the future and the transformation necessary to create the 100,000 jobs, which is a clear target set by Government, this is going to take time. From the first day, I said it would take time and that I would not be setting annual targets because they would be unrealistic. The Deputy persists, however, in coming back with the same question.

We have a job of work to do to change an economy that has been devastated. The banks are broken and much of our costs base was smashed. Much of the base of our economy was damaged and we have to restore that. We are making progress. We see international confidence come back. The IDA had the best year in a decade last year. We are seeing indigenous companies winning new markets. That is the route to rebuilding our economy, on enterprise, innovation and exports. We are making credible progress in this area.

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