Ireland is 'banjaxed' after IMF deal announced

Angry reaction from opposition parties

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Irish Government will raid the national pension fund and other cash reserves for €17.5bn, as a condition of the deal, to bail out its banks

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Although, he said, the deal was as expect he still believes that interest rate, of 5.8 percent, is too high.

He called it a “a peculiar arrangement where there's a subsidiary fund against losses attached to this - so to get €100 you can use, you must borrow €120 and pay interest on the lot.'

Mr Noonan said that pitch the rate so high would force Ireland back to the bond market.

In a statement issued by Mr Noonan he said “The Government has been out-bid and out-negotiated at every turn. For some reason the Government decided to play it soft, and allowed the IMF, the EU and the ECB to win hands down.'

The Irish Business and Employers Confederation (IBEC) have estimated that the interest rate will cost Ireland about €5 billion per year. Head of IBEC, Danny McCoy, said that Ireland must now get the economy growing, get as many people as possible back to work and help pay off this debt.
 
President of the Sinn Féin Party, Gerry Adams said that the deal is terrible. He described the interest rate as unaffordable and said the decision to take money from the Pensions Reserve Fund is a disaster. He said this money would just be poured into the black hold that “is our banking system”.

Sinn Féin’s parliamentary leader, Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin said the Irish Government’s deal “condemns this and future generations of Irish people to economic bondage for many years to come”.

Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU) General Secretary, David Begg, said the interest rate is penal, too high and that the EU had done us no favors. He called the labor reforms mentioned in the deal a euphemism for reducing the minimum wage. He pledged that the ICTU would fight this point.

Jack O'Connor, the General Secretary of the Services, Industrial, Professional and Technical Union called the deal a shameful indictment of the right-wing policies which have formed the Irish Government over the last 13 years.

Mr O’Connor said that the deal means senior bank bondholders would be protected while the lower paid in the country would be crucified.

He said “The plan unveiled today should have been announced in Lourdes because, short of a miracle, it is doomed to failure.”

The Governor of Ireland’s Central Bank, Patrick Honohan, said that he welcomed the deal. He said the support of the European Commission, ECB and the IMF means a clear path has been set for the economy of Ireland. He said the program endorses the current Irish policy approach to banks. He also said that it provides the necessary assurance to achieve reconfiguration and the downsizing of the banks.

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