Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein)
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To ask the Minister for Finance his latest estimate of nominal Gross Domestic Product in 2012. [49485/12]

Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein)
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To ask the Minister for Finance his latest estimate of the 2012 State deficit which stood at €14,071,652,000 at the end of October 2012. [49486/12]

Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein)
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To ask the Minister for Finance his latest estimate of deficit Gross Domestic Product in 2012 and if it remains the case that the State will meet its target deficit GDP of 8.6% or less in 2012 as set out in the Memorandum of Understanding with the IMF/EU/ECB. [49487/12]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 202, 203 and 204 together.

In April’s Stability Programme Update (SPU), 2012 nominal GDP was forecast at €158,925 million. This represented a growth rate of 1.6 per cent over the 2011 level of nominal GDP, based on the prevailing 2011 GDP estimates from the CSO. In the interim however, the CSO has revised up its estimate of 2011 nominal GDP to €158,993 million which will increase the starting point for my Department’s next formal forecast for 2012 nominal GDP, set to be released shortly. On a purely technical basis however, 2012 nominal GDP was estimated at €162,500 million (rounded to the nearest ½ billion) in the recent Maastricht returns by applying the 2012 SPU nominal growth rate to the revised CSO base for 2012.

The €14.1 billion deficit the Deputy refers to is the Exchequer deficit as of end-October 2012 and this is the most up to date assessment of the Exchequer cash position. The most recent estimate of the General Government deficit for 2012 is €13.6 billion or 8.4 per cent of GDP, as set out in the recent Maastricht Returns. This is a significant improvement on the underlying deficit of €16.7 billion or 10.7 per cent of GDP recorded in 2010. Importantly also, this latest 2012 deficit estimate is within the 8.6 per cent of GDP limit set by the ECOFIN Council in December 2010. The eighth quarterly review of the EU/IMF Programme also concluded that it was likely that Ireland would meet its 2012 deficit target.

My Department will be publishing its updated economic and fiscal forecasts shortly.