Sustaining Progress - Department of Taoiseach

■ regaining and sustaining Ireland’s competitiveness in its cost dimension and in all its other
dimensions;
■ especially as the economy returns to full potential, restoring balance in the public finances, with
current public expenditure growing no faster than GNP, and the Debt:GNP ratio continuing its
gradual decline, thus underpinning budgetary sustainability and keeping the public finances close
to balance for the period 2003-2005;
■ within that budgetary framework, maintaining a high level of infrastructure investment focused
on improving the productive capacity of the economy;
■ addressing structural deficits and supply side weaknesses that limit the capacity to achieve strong
economic growth and thereby sustain high employment;
■ promoting and maintaining competition across all sectors of the economy to ensure maximum
efficiencies and lowest cost goods and services for the citizen;
■ ensuring that an appropriate balance between consumer and producer interests is at the centre of
policy making by promoting greater consultation and transparency in formulating legislation and
regulation;
■ renewing focus on the quality and quantity of new and existing regulations (including
enforcement) so as to minimise burdens, to reduce market entry barriers and to increase
entrepreneurship and innovation;
■ taking account of the need to reduce pressures on the environment and respect Ireland’s
international obligations;
■ establishing appropriate regulatory arrangements for the economy which are designed to achieve
competitiveness gains while safeguarding the public interest, in particular with regard to
maintaining “services of general interest” and the need to ensure infrastructural investment; and
■ focusing on what is necessary to enable the economy to retain and expand high value-added
economic activity, while supporting the goal of a society that is more socially inclusive and
environmentally sustainable.
Chapter 3 Macroeconomic Policy
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