Ivor Callely
Question:60 Mr. Callely asked the Minister for Finance the estimated variances between GDP and GNP for 1999; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [26795/99]
Written Answers. - Fiscal Policy.
My Department's latest estimate for Gross Domestic Product for 1999 is £66.8 billion compared with Gross National Product of £58.2 billion, a difference of £8.6 billion or 13% of GDP. This compares to a gap of £7.5 billion in 1998 which was equivalent to 12.5% of GDP.
The difference between GNP and GDP consists of a number of items, the most important of which are profit repatriations of foreign owned companies and interest payments on the foreign held components of the national debt.
The increase in the difference between GNP and GDP in recent years is indicative of the success this country has had in attracting foreign direct investment. The bulk of this investment is in high-tech, high-productivity and export-oriented industries which have transformed manufacturing industry in Ireland. It reflects the competitiveness of the Irish economy which has underpinned the strong economic growth over the last decade. One of the key challenges is to maintain competitiveness and our attractiveness for FDI.
Michael D. Higgins
Question:61 Mr. M. Higgins asked the Minister for Finance when he will resume the implementation of the multi-annual budgeting strategy which he suspended earlier in 1999; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [26913/99]
I said in my 1999 Budget Statement that I would address the final phase of the move to multi-annual expenditure budgeting, involving the Government making decisions on the allocation of resources across vote groups, to give financial envelopes for those vote groups, by the end of the first quarter of 1999.
I announced subsequently that I had decided to seek decisions on financial envelopes when the national development plan was finalised. I said that it was my intention that financial envelopes would be decided by the Government for the years 2001 and 2002 in the first quarter of 2000.
The multi-annual budgetary information and data published with the 2000 budget followed the same format as in the 1999 budget. Projections were published for 2001 and 2002 of the main budgetary aggregates and of expenditure on a "no policy change" basis by ministerial vote group. The latter projections provide the technical basis from which proposals on financial envelopes for consideration by the Government will be prepared. Account will be taken, in this process, of expenditure undertakings in a new national programme to follow Partnership 2000.