BRUSSELS (MNI) – The Irish government has to do everything that is
needed to get its budget deficit below 3% by 2014, including
front-loading its fiscal measures, European Central Bank President
Jean-Claude Trichet said on Thursday.
The Irish government has committed to getting its budget deficit
below the EU’s 3% limit by 2014, but lower-than-expected growth this
year means that more cuts are needed to attain the target. At 1530 GMT
the Irish government is set to give further details on the measures it
plans to take between now and 2014.
The costs of bailing out Ireland’s banking system will push the
country’s budget deficit to 32% of its GDP this year. Stripping out the
banks, the deficit is around 11% this year, still the largest in the
Eurozone.
“We are now at 3 O’Clock in the afternoon and there is a rendezvous
in Ireland this afternoon precisely for the government to explain part
of the four year program,” Trichet told reporters at a press conference
in Frankfurt.
“I would only say at this stage that the 15 billion that you
mentioned are not in our view insufficient, at the moment I am speaking,
but you have to be permanently alert and stand ready to do all what is
needed,” he added.
“The ultimate goal… is that 3% at the end of the period (to
2014), and I think that the market observers, savers, investors are
looking with great, great attention to what the minister and the
government will say precisely in a few hours,” he said.
“On the front loading, it is of extreme importance,” Trichet said.
“I have no reason to think at the present moment that the observers will
be disappointed [by today's Irish government announcement]… but it is
up to the minister to deliver the message.”
Trichet was speaking at a press conference after the ECB said it
was leaving its main refinancing rate at 1%, where it has been since a
25-point cut after the Governing Council’s May 7, 2009 meeting.
–Brussels: 0032 487 (0) 32 803 665, echarlton@marketnews.com
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