International Federation of Accountants

Yeah.

So the point being, of course, is that all of the warnings that you've heard me make and subsequently rescind about the fiscal sustainability of Ireland, more seriously, all of the IFAC-type warnings about the fiscal sustainability of Ireland, at the moment, international investors are not bothered by IFAC's warnings at all, are they? No,

no, they're not.

No, no.

And they want auditors to verify that holistic view.

The study guide highlights this phenomenal statistic from the International Federation of Accountants from 2023.

They reported that 95% of reviewed companies are now reporting sustainability information.

That is almost everybody.

But depending on what measure you use, as a percentage of national income, Government spending has actually fallen from about 44% of national income in 2016 to about 40% today.

So when Micheál Martin has been in the news the past couple of weeks, I think, saying, look, I know we're getting a lot of pressure from IFAC and the ESRI and others, etc., but we're actually – where government spending is just keeping afloat with the size of the economy.

And there's a lot of truth to that, actually.

So as a percentage of national income, public spending in Ireland is not that high.

And then all these expectations in terms of investment, investment in housing, investment in public transport.

Investment in childcare infrastructure, investment.

So I just personally, and I don't mean to criticise IFAC here, but I just don't think it's realistic to think that you can have a fixed rule that can cut across time and space and not be contextualised to what a given year is.

But is it a good thing for government to be like, you know, what's the word I'm looking for here? I think we need to get value for money.

I will begin by quoting a letter in the Irish Times today that I think must have been from a listener, echoing the discussion we had a couple of weeks ago.

asking the question, why on earth doesn't the government save some of this precious government spending money that everybody criticizes it for by abolishing IFAC? And it was very much a tongue-in-cheek letter, very much as our original question was, because yet again, IFAC has been ignored.

But IFAC did put out a press release that to get a little bit of coverage, nowhere near as much as it deserved, and...

It was brilliant, actually.

I loved every single word of it.

And I'm going to summarize what it said.

It says the government is spending six out of every seven euros it gets from corporation tax, and most of that six euros is on government spending, thereby violating our rule, which is that you shouldn't spend temporary revenues on permanent spending commitments.

IFAC goes on to remind the government about its own promises.

I think the prudent control of public spending is very important.

And I know people, IFAC and those, will come out and criticise that spending is still growing too strongly.

But at the end of the day, it's easy for economists or IFAC, whoever, to stand on the sideline and criticise the political system over what it's doing.

We don't have to get re-elected.

And I think any budget, particularly this one, should be seen in the context of the political realities out there.

To

use a phrase.

I suppose there was a reference, and Jim, you mentioned IFAC earlier, and IFAC tends to be quite a vocal critic of what's happening in terms of government spend versus corporation tax and that.

And so the reality here is that there have been years of under-provision and, frankly, unrealistic savings targets.

This isn't something that I'm just saying or others like as we heard Professor John McHale and Professor Seamus Coffey from IFAC during the week talking about that there is a systematic, a systemic problem in how we fund for health.

And the reality is that we've got rising demand, increasing complexity of care.

And yet this was to be a year of first of no supplementary budget.

And, um, you know, as you mentioned in your, in your introduction, getting that balance right.

You know, you have the IMF and the IFAC and the, the watchdogs saying that, you know, they can't overstimulate the economy, um, and any giveaway budget or any, you know, too, too much, t- too much enhancement or too many cost of living measures, uh, could have a nevi- negative impact.

So a real challenge to get that balance right.

Um, and you know, there, there has been and there had to be some, some cost of living measures.