Head over to our T
Exchequer Figures – deficit more than doubles
Read more about: Comment, Economy, Government, Taxation 
Exchequer figures were released by the dept of finance in the last few hours.
Don’t worry, I’ve no wince-inducing chart this time.
Main points, Exchequer deficit now stands at €14,709,153,000 (€14.7bn), this time last year it was €5.6bn.
So, more than doubled between Jan 08 and Jan 09, ouchies.
It should be noted however that €3bn of that increase did go into Anglo while another €3bn went into the National Pensions Reserve Fund – so it’s one of those ones that’s ugly from a distance but better than expected close up. At least that’s what I tell myself in those types of situations… ehem, socially, personally and economically.
Tax revenue is down more than €3bn year-on-year.
For more official/informative stuff, The Irish Times have covered it in some depth online already.
One thing I found eye-catching in my brief skim over the figures: the cost of paying interest on the national debt. That alone jumped from €1.3bn to €1.8bn. That’s some amount of money (€500m) down the drain – and Moody’s just lowered our credit rating again today, which will further drive the price of borrowing. The cost of ‘Sinking Fund Contributions’ (expert economists, define-me-up), which come under the same “Servicing the National Debt” heading, increased from €449 to €572m also while ‘Other Debt Management Expsenses’, again under that heading, went up from €31.8m to €47m.
I suppose it’s simply the reality of global economics but it hurts when you read about the increasing price of having a sinking economy. What do you lot reckon should be done with it?
Aside: In the last few weeks I’ve been trying to rile myself up for a big lovely ranty post about how politicians in general are reacting to, and handling, our economy – I think tonight is the night. Wish me luck, I’ll be back when I get home from work with a juicy one for you all to tell me I’m wrong about everything…
And finally – FYI, David Cochrane said that Brian Lenihan will be the sole guest on Nightly News with Vincent Browne tonight, if correct, get yizzer popcorn boys and girls, it’ll be fun-times. Cian, if you’re reading this – rev-up the homepage liveblog.
The numbers really bring out that from An Bord Snip Nua perspective, there really are just 3 areas that account for a huge chunk of the budget and therefore where any big cuts will come from: education, health, and social/family. Perhaps transport but it’s not clear what one can cut there. The IMF report was pretty clear that the next round of retrenchment is coming from expenditure, so the tough decisions have yet to be made in that regard.
the tough decisions have yet to be made in that regard.
Yet it is the first line out of the mouths of most ministers at the moment ‘tough decisions we have made’ indeed they decided not to publish An Bord Snip – which I hear is politically a timebomb if they publish it in full. No decision on that until Autumn.
The question about cuts is how much will feed into a downward spiral as they will harm front line services (either as a byproduct of targetted cuts or as a soft option versus systemic reform).
The other major spin line yesterday was ‘hoorah we have got our projetions right’ with regard to the tax take. They are only 1.2% behind the projection in April – which is still behind no matter how you spin it – but it took them since last June to get that problem in order. God knows how many attempts it will take to get something like a cogent strategy together.
And finally – FYI, David Cochrane said that Brian Lenihan will be the sole guest on Nightly News with Vincent Browne tonight
John McGuiness been opening his big mouth again?