TÁNAISTE AND Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Mary Coughlan has denied any difference of views between herself and Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan over the contents of the forthcoming budget.
Speaking to journalists last Thursday, Ms Coughlan had said that Mr Lenihan "spent a considerable period of time with construction people over the weekend and he will be taking into consideration many of these issues and not just for first-time buyers but for those who need to move on".
Mr Lenihan said afterwards that any suggestion of special measures on housing was "speculation" and that he had been talking to "a wide variety of interests" about the economic situation.
Commenting on the matter yesterday, Ms Coughlan denied there was any difference of views. "Somebody should actually listen to what I had to say. There was no differential between myself and the Minister for Finance initially, I have to say."
She continued: "Under no circumstances is any issue which is confidential or would have any impact on the market going to be discussed between now and the day and the minute the Minister for Finance stands up in the House.
"And I think it's appropriate that we, through speculation, do not give wrong messages because at the end of the day no one in the media will know exactly what is going to happen on the 14th of October until it is a public pronouncement.
"And therefore, it has to be said, as the Minister for Finance has said, there are a lot of issues that are going to be looked at and addressed and there are going to be some very difficult decisions made by all of the Cabinet."
Responding to Labour leader Eamon Gilmore's suggestion that the Taoiseach had been either a "fool or a liar" in his previous handling of the Finance portfolio, Ms Coughlan told journalists in Dublin: "I think we'll rise above those [comments]. At the end of the day, we can get into a political banter on name-calling which will prove absolutely nothing and will actually do nothing for politics.
"What we are doing is, in a very short period of time, dealing with the issue of the budgetary framework, looking at the management of the finances. There are realities there from an international perspective - I'm glad to see that oil has been reduced for example - we also have had the impact of the decision by the US government [the takeover of home loan firms Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac] and some stability so far within the stock exchange.
"Those are good things to hear; our job is to ensure that we can sustain our employment in this position that we presently are [in] and to look at new ideas on when we have employment growth."
Commenting on the budgetary outlook in general, she said: "We have to look very seriously at a number of issues. We are presently finalising our estimates for tomorrow. There will be further bilateral occasions then with the Minister for Finance. Really what's happening is, that the time-frame for the work that would have been done previously up to December of this year is now being consolidated into a much shorter period of time.
"As well as that, as you know, we are very anxious that the issue of the pay talks would be brought to finality if at all possible at the end of this week. And I'm also working with a number of colleagues on a number of new initiatives when it comes to sustainability of our employment and most particularly looking at a new key message when it comes to foreign direct investment and also supporting Irish companies," she said.
