We need a tourism tsar. Are you right there, Michael, are you right?

BUSINESS strategy has three fundamentals: grow revenue, maintain margins and cut costs. Ireland Inc is now reducing its cost base with unprecedented deflation of 5% over the past year. The public finances trade at a monthly loss of €2bn and the first budgetary steps were taken to arrest this fiscal deficit.

Fixing the fractured balance sheets of the banks is pivotal to our economic solvency and growth prospects. This “batten down the hatches” retrenchment has been criticised as excessively negative and narrow. Where’s the job creation strategy?

Politicians and pundits who call on governments to create jobs misunderstand why employers hire workers. Employment is a byproduct of profitable investment. Without viable commercial enterprises, job creation is irrelevant. State employment, whether through public services or basic community employment schemes, has to be funded by tax revenues from real businesses. Unemployment is a symptom and consequence of recession rather than a cause.