Lenihan rules out snap budget
There had been speculation in some quarters that the Government would need to resort to an early budget to prove it was managing the country’s debt problem.
But Mr Lenihan insisted that this was not the case. He said the most recent monthly exchequer figures, published last week, showed the stabilisation of the country’s finances was on target.
Speaking of Sunday’s meeting of EU finance ministers at which the eurozone rescue mechanism was agreed, Mr Lenihan said: “I do want to emphasise that there was no suggestion at any stage in the meetings… that Ireland has any difficulties whatsoever.”
Asked if there was now a case for an early budget, he replied: “No, and that hasn’t been suggested at all (at the meeting). And there’ll be no suggestion of that...”
“It’s very clear now after four months [of the year] that both on revenue and on expenditure, we’re on target. So there is no question of any pressure on Ireland to draw up an early budget,” he said.
“What we’ve seen [at the meeting] is a discussion among the finance ministers about a problem which is European-wide; it’s not a problem connected with Ireland.”
Mr Lenihan also played down talks that other countries would suffer similar problems to Greece.
“There’s no suggestion that any state other than Greece has funding difficulties but it was important that we show we have a credible method of resolving those funding difficulties. And we’ve agreed such a credible method.”
Fine Gael finance spokes- man Richard Bruton welcomed the rescue package but said both Ireland and the EU as a whole were still devoid of strategies to create jobs and restore economic growth.
“While the new package will temporarily ease fears of contagion and the financing pressures on high-deficit countries for the remainder of 2010, there is still a lack of credible plans to restore sufficient competitiveness, growth and employment to highly-indebted countries so that they can trade their way out of their debt burdens,” Mr Bruton said.
“For example, a commitment by EU finance ministers to increase funding from the European Investment Bank for investment in commercial infrastructure, such as next-generation broadband, would have been welcome.”
Mr Bruton said that from a national perspective, Ireland “cannot afford to breathe a sigh of relief and pretend that the crisis is now over”.
Instead, the Government would have to set out a “major restructuring” of the public services and produce an ambitious growth and employment strategy.
