Fianna Fáil has been main party of coalition goverments of Ireland since 1997 and has squandered an impressive economic boom that has now faded. While the national debt was reduced in the early years of the economic boom, this is now set to rocket. During the boom years, no significant improvements were made to the pitiful public health system or inadequate transport infrastructure despite huge increases in the numbers of managers in the civil service. An inflated public sector pay bill is one lasting relic of the economic boom.

Ireland is currently suffering from fears that it may default on its national debt thanks to the collapse of a speculative property bubble and its impact on the construction sector and the country’s financial system. Most of the spurious loans that financed the Irish property bubble have been guaranteed by the Irish state and the losses on the inevitable defaults will be bourn by the Irish taxpayer. Irish GDP will contract by at least 6% in 2009.