Barry Cowen (Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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127. To ask the Minister for Finance to outline the spending commitments or paying down of debt the Government has entered into with regard to the profits arising from the partial sale of the State's stake in a bank (details supplied); and if he will make a statement on the matter. [8108/17]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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In the first instance it is important to note that these type of transactions, i.e. the sale of shares in our banking investments, do not result in a beneficial impact to the General Government Balance (GGB) under ESA 2010 rules. This is due to the fact that they are classified as a 'financial transaction' or essentially the exchange of one form of asset (shares, equities, loans) for another (cash). Consequently, the sale of any shareholding in any of the banks would not count as general government revenue. Therefore, there is not generally any increased capacity to spend as a result of the sale of shares without affecting the general government balance.

As I have previously stated, the re-capitalisation of our banking sector has added to the stock of general government debt and in turn increased our annual debt servicing costs. It has always been the Government's intention to use receipts from the disposal of the State's banking investments to pay down this debt and help reduce the debt servicing costs. Given the uncertainty around the timing of or the monies realised from any disposal, this has not been included our debt forecasts. Debt reduction underpinned by our lower national debt target of 45 per cent of GDP, will increase the resilience of the public finances to deal with any potential shocks which may emerge.