This is unprecedented – the press conference is actually kicking off on time. Michael Noonan has to be in the Dáil at 12.30 so it’s going to be a quick one.

Noonan cites a lot of the commitments that were due to be delivered between July and September – the Credit Union Bill, the Industrial Relations Act – and says they have all been fulfilled. “We have also fulfilled our fiscal targets [for the period]” he says.

Noonan: We have drawn down about 80 per cent of the funds available to us and we have fulfilled about 160 different conditions, so now we’re looking at exiting the programme when it finishes at the end of 2013 (or as Noonan calls it, “two thirteen).

Brendan Howlin echoes what Noonan said about the focus being on exiting the programme now and “running our country in a normal way”.

Howlin says there are three strands to the government’s policy:

• Balancing public finances – he says Ireland is on track to have the deficit below 3 per cent by 2015
• Dealing with the overhang of bank debt – he says technical work is ongoing in relation to that (but doesn’t go into specifics)
• Restoring growth and jobs again

Howlin says Ireland is a “well-performing programme” overall. He says there are two pressure points: high unemployment and the difficulties with the health system.

There is now a question being asked in Irish so I am completely useless in deciphering what is being said.

(Image: MerrionStreet.ie)

Surprised it took this long to be brought up properly, but the Ministers are now being asked about the bank debt deal, which has been the focus of a whole lot of confusion over the past week.

Noonan says the only additional information beyond what has been made public – i.e. Merkel and Hollande both saying separately that Ireland is a special case – is that the number of people with impaired mortgages is remaining fairly constant and the number of new people with impaired mortgages has dropped quite a lot, so the government is going to look at this again at the next review.

Noonan on the promissory note: We’re working on the prom note*. We don’t have details now but we have a reasonably good interchange with the ECB who are the people we need to deal with rather than the Troika. It would be convenient if we could get something done before the Budget, but that’s unlikely.

*Yes, he called it the ‘prom note’.

Noonan is describing what it’s like for countries coming out of a bailout programme: There’s always a bit of hand-holding, he says. It’s not like there’s one jump and they’re free.

“We are not looking for a second bailout,” says Noonan.

Michael Noonan is really emphatic that he doesn’t think Ireland is going to need a second bailout when the current programme ends in December 2013.

He says the important thing is for the NTMA to be able to raise money on the markets at low interest rates and that’s going to be crucial.

Noonan: “I am very confident that we will exit the programme in all circumstances [at the end of 2013] and we will be back on the markets”.

He says the unknown variable right now is the level of interest that Ireland would have to pay on the markets.

Howlin: “We are the most successful programme, we have hit all the targets and I think there is a palpable will” across Europe that wants Ireland to succeed.

(Image: MerrionStreet.ie)

Mild laughter at the press conference as one of the journalists asks Noonan and Howlin to turn off their mobile phones as it’s interfering with the sound. This happens at almost every single Troika review press conference.

Noonan is asked what kind of interest rate he’d like to see Ireland being able to borrow at, since that’s what he described as the ‘variable’ when it comes to the country returning to the markets.

He says he’d like to see Ireland borrowing at as close as we can get to current official rates of between 3 and 3.5. He says we’re currently not far off that – this morning Ireland’s 5 year bonds were at 3.36, which he said isn’t bad – obviously 5 years isn’t a long time so it wouldn’t be ideal, but the 10 year bonds were at 4.67 so that’s not a million miles off from the target.

This is probably the main point coming from the conference – Noonan is talking again about the discussion with the Troika about exiting the programme.

“What we did this morning was we moved… on to having a short discussion about how we could exit the programme and if assistance would be available on exiting the programme and the answer was yes”.

Crucially, he says there has been no discussion in government about this but there has been some discussion between him and Brendan Howlin about it.

Howlin says the Troika didn’t bring up the Croke Park Agreement so he thought he should bring it up with them. “They’re content with the savings we set out,” he says.

…And that’s it. Probably the shortest conference we’ve had from government ministers about a Troika review but a few interesting things there.

• Ireland has drawn down about 80 per cent of bailout funding now and fulfilled about 160 conditions.
• The EU and IMF will publish a paper before Christmas on options for leaving the bailout programme.
• Noonan does not think Ireland will require a second bailout.
• Growth forecasts for next year will probably be revised downwards slightly but that won’t affect government commitments to the programme.

Here’s the full details from the Department of Finance about Ireland’s successful completion of the 8th Troika review.

In line with each of the previous quarterly reviews, Ireland has met all of the commitments and our continued strong programme implementation has been recognized by the Troika.

From the Department of Finance:

The upcoming Budget will deliver a further budgetary correction. There is no doubt that this will be difficult but Budget 2013 will be as fair and equitable as possible and will be consistent with the Governments key objective of growing the economy and getting people back to work.”

That’s all folks. Cheers for reading. Only three months to wait until the 9th quarterly review from the Troika…