Turkey leaders won’t be voting for Christmas

IT is repetitive in the extreme to suggest that this was another momentous week for Ireland, but the truth is that it was. However, it has joined a lot of other momentous weeks for Ireland in recent times.

We now have in theory a better idea of what extra taxes and cutbacks in public expenditure we will have to endure over the next four years and that gives some certainty, which is helpful. However, we have been assured on numerous occasions over the past three years about issues in relation to the economy, the cost of the bank bailout and the necessary fiscal adjustment, but we were misled on every occasion.

Don’t forget that Brian Lenihan told us last December that Budget 2010 would be the toughest in this fiscal cycle and that the economy had turned the corner. For those who believed this rhetoric and acted accordingly, a very expensive lesson has been learned.