Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Independent)
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133. To ask the Minister for Finance the expected interest payments on Irish national debt in 2015 and the projections for the years 2016 to 2020; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [32828/15]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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The most recent forecasts of both National Debt interest and General Government interest expenditure for the period 2015 to 2020 are contained in the 2015 Stability Programme Update (SPU), published by my Department in April of this year.

The relevant information is contained in Table A3, Annex 1 of the SPU and is replicated in the table below for the Deputy's convenience.

The National debt interest figures outlined in the table represent the projected cash interest cost of the National debt. National debt interest expenditure for 2015 was projected in April at just over €7.1 billion, a reduction of over €300 million or 4.4 per cent on the 2014 outturn. Notably, this will be the first year-on-year reduction in National debt interest expenditure since 2008 and is largely due to the early repayment of the more expensive portion of loans from the IMF and its replacement with cheaper, market based funding.

National Debt interest expenditure in the first eight months of 2015 was just over €4.5 billion.  This represented a year-on-year decline of €306 million or 6.3 per cent primarily because of the reduction in interest payable to the IMF arising from the early repayments. Interest payments to the IMF in the first eight months of this year were over 60 per cent lower than the same period in 2014.

Interest expenditure was €396 million or 8.1 per cent below the Budget 2015 consistent profile at end-August. The early repayment of the full amount of IMF loans subject to the highest rate of charge as well as the pace of those repayments is a significant reason for interest expenditure being below profile. The minimal cash cost in 2015 from this year's bond issuance is another contributory factor.

General Government interest figures on the other hand are prepared on an ESA10 accrual basis and represent the projected interest cost of the wider General Government measure of debt.

Budget 2016 which will be published by my Department next month will contain updated projections for both National Debt interest and General Government interest expenditure.