Donnelly questions Noonan's claims about Ireland meeting EU-IMF targets

AN INDEPENDENT TD has questioned the Government’s claim that it is “meeting its targets” in the deal with the European Union (EU) and International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Stephen Donnelly(Wicklow) referred to remarks by Minister for Finance Michael Noonan that Ireland was fulfilling its remit as nominally agreed by Fianna Fáil in the previous government "but let's look at what is happening in the real economy".

“Government debt has been downgraded to one notch above junk status. Bank debt has been downgraded to junk status. Unemployment is due to rise by tens of thousands and the growth forecast, unsurprisingly, has been halved.”

He was speaking during the Dáil debate on the review of the first six months of the EU-IMF deal. Mr Donnelly said that in opposition Mr Noonan had described the deal as an “obscenity”. Mr Donnelly agreed it was and remained an obscenity.

“The Government claims repeatedly to have a mandate, and it does. It has a mandate to stand up to foreign powers and to fight for the Irish people and to regain our independence. It has a mandate to stand up to powerful investors and bankers. However, it does not have a mandate to continue to implement Fianna Fáil policy. Nor does it have a mandate to do the opposite of what it said it would do during the general election campaign.”

Thomas Pringle(Ind, Donegal South West) said that the Government had "rolled over" and made the EU-IMF deal "its own". He said it "can no longer blame Fianna Fáil or the previous administration as it has done many times in the Chamber in recent weeks in the context of the bailout, bank recapitalisation and austerity measures that were foisted on us in the deal. The Government has made the deal its own through the publication of the programme."

Liam Twomey(FG, Wexford) said "paying for the legacy of Fianna Fáil's ruination of our reputation and our economy means that our schools, hospitals and social services will be receiving less funding for the next decade regardless of what we do. Already people are suffering and we do not need to compound that with half-baked ideas about defaulting".

But Dara Calleary(FF, Mayo) rounded on the Fine Gael TD and said he was the "latest in the chorus to claim we are constrained by the straitjacket left by the previous government. If the deputy thought he could, he would probably try to pin responsibility for the kidnap of Shergar and several other incidents on the previous government."

But Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Brendan Howlindefended the Government's approach. "A bad deal was negotiated last year but it was a solemn deal negotiated not by Fianna Fáil, but by the government at the time and it was voted on by the parliament and we are stuck with it."

He said that while the programme was “not monumentally different from that which went before” it was “substantially different. We have managed to renegotiate a number of aspects but this is the start of a process.

“This is not the last time we will renegotiate,” he said.