Marc MacSharry (Fianna Fail)

It is a legitimate point to make. While it is perfectly legitimate to play the ball and criticise the Minister of the day for the policy that is to be implemented, in this environment one must not deny the resilience of this great nation, its people and their ability to overcome the challenges that have been presented to them. It is worth noting that in the depths of this serious crisis, namely, the substantial borrowings that will have to be taken to meet the shortfall between what we are spending and what we are taking in, the debt to GDP ratio in 1987 was in the region of 125% and even now, following a full drawdown of the facility being made available by the IMF, it would still be in the region of 102%.