We have Restored the Economy

Jobs

• 138,000 jobs have been created since the Action Plan for Jobs in 2012.
• Unemployment rate is down to 8.8% from a peak of 15.1% in 2011.
• Employment has grown in all 8 regions since the Action Plan for Jobs.

Growth

• The economy is now bigger than the size it was before the crash.
• We are the fastest growing economy in Europe with 7.8% GDP growth in 2015, after 5.2% growth in 2014.
• Domestic demand has returned to growth in 2014 and 2015.

Bond Yields

• International confidence is restored. We sold a 10 year bond in January 2016 for a 1.15% yield, compared to 14% yields in July 2011.
• Regained ‘investment-grade’ status with Moody’s / S&P / Fitch.
• We are Repairing the Damage

Deficit

• The deficit has fallen from €18bn in 2010 to a forecast €4bn in 2015.
• We did not increase income tax and have now started reducing it & USC

Mortgage Arrears

• The number of primary home mortgages in arrears has decreased by over 54,000 mortgages or 38% since the peak in June 2013.
• Long term arrears (over 2 years) have decreased for the last 2 quarters.
• This is after the Personal Insolvency Bill in Dec 2012, and the Central Bank’s mortgage arrears targets for the main banks in March 2013.
• The no. of mortgages in negative equity has decreased from 315,000 in 2012 to approx. 100,000 now.

Banking Cost

• FG in government only put €17.8bn into the pillar banks and we will get all this back in time; we put nothing into the dead banks of Anglo / INBS.
• It was FF who bailed out Anglo and we will not get all this money back But FG have reduced this cost by getting rid of the promissory notes.
• Only 20% of our national debt is from the banks. The majority is due to the deficit created by FF, borrowing to fund Social Welfare, Health etc.
• Only approx €800m of our €7.5bn in interest costs is banking related.