Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Labour)
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Question 187: To ask the Taoiseach the details of the respective assumptions made by the Central Statistics Office in terms of expectations of growth in the economy in arriving at its M1 and M2 projections for migration flows to and from Ireland to 2036 in its publication Population and Labour Force Projections, 2006-2036. [8774/08]

Tom Kitt (Dublin South, Fianna Fail)
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The projections, which were published in December 2004 and relate to the 2002 Census, provided from a (then) current perspective two contrasting scenarios to reflect the likely range of possible outcomes in respect of international migration. No explicit assumptions were made in respect of expected growth in the economy. Instead, two migration assumptions M1 and M2 were framed by the Expert Group in such a way as to give a likely range for migration over the projection period, having regard to recent experience across a range of factors such as the structure of the population and likely national and international trends in relevant areas.

Issues that were taken into consideration in framing the two scenarios included:

the capacity of our infrastructure to cope with continuing high population growth;

reduced labour supply due to the decline in births in the 1980s and 1990s;

demographic 'pull' factors arising from a more rapidly aging population structure in other European countries;

sharply decreased pool of Irish migrants living abroad.

Updated projections based on the 2006 Census have been finalised and will be published shortly.