Covid-19 finances: 'We can afford it, but doubts would begin to emerge after six months'
The State can afford the huge expenditure bill and hit to revenue from the Covid-19 crisis for six months but the sustainability of the finances starts to come into question if the pandemic fallout extends for a longer period, warns Seamus Coffey, the former chair of the budget watchdog.
It comes as Taoiseach Leo Varadkar co-signed a letter with the leaders of eight other European nations in a bid for the eurozone to consider issuing so-called corona bonds and for the EU to shoulder the huge fiscal costs entailed in fighting the pandemic and saving millions of jobs from the economic storm.
