Dominic Hannigan (Meath East, Labour)
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40. To ask the Minister for Finance if his Department has looked into the possibility of repaying the IMF loans early to further bring down the cost of borrowing for the State; the impact this would have on the long term debt plan for the country; if any discussion has been had with the EFSF or the commission regarding the possibility of paying back the IMF loans quicker without having to pay back equal amounts to the EFSF or ESM; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [17070/14]

Dominic Hannigan (Meath East, Labour)
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41. To ask the Minister for Finance if his Department had talks with the either the IMF, Commission or ECB regarding the possibility of renegotiating the clause in the original Troika deal whereby any repayment of loans from either the EU or IMF would mean a proportionate repayment of the other bailout loans; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [17071/14]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 40 and 41 together.

As I have previously outlined in my replies to PQ's 178 (6839/14) of 11 February 2014 and 21 (16171/14) of 8 April 2014, the question of early repayment of any one lender cannot be treated in isolation from other lenders and market expectations for when programme loans are due to be repaid. The early repayment of IMF funds would trigger automatic mandatory proportional early repayments to the EFSF, EFSM, United Kingdom, Kingdom of Sweden and Kingdom of Denmark. This would also apply in respect of the early repayment of the loans from any of the other programme funding partners.

The impact of early repayment of our IMF loans on our bond yields would need to be carefully considered were such a possibility to arise. Should that possibility arise, I would take the advice of the NTMA on this matter. If such a proposal were to be pursued, the agreement of the other lenders would of course be required.

 The provisions in question are included in the loan agreements with the EFSF, EFSM and the UK, Sweden and Denmark, as was set out in my reply to PQ 6839/14 of 11 February 2014, 

As I have outlined previously, the matter of early repayment of our IMF loans, and thus requesting agreement to repay Ireland's IMF loans prior to the maturity dates, does not arise at the moment but we will keep it under review. In view of this, the issue of discussions with the EFSF, EFSM and the bilateral lenders regarding such early repayment also does not arise.

I should also point out that, as the IMF loans have a shorter average maturity, they will be repaid considerably in advance of the EFSF and EFSM loans for which we negotiated maturity extensions.