Damien McCarthy

on top of everything else that has been introduced over the last number of years, which is a cost to businesses and it can threaten business and threaten jobs as well.

So we have to be careful about this type of thing, but I think adding in public holidays in November, when they're only going to perform as poorly from an economic point of view as the February one, which is the last one, and you're only as good as your last game.

And,

Our last game was the February public holiday that we introduced and it's costing hundreds of millions every year.

Well, they say that every public holiday costs the economy 355 million.

Now, I think the big thing with public holidays is its timing.

You know, some of them work from an economic point of view, others don't.

The summer ones work well.

May, June, August and also the October actually, which is a very good one.

It contributes to the economy.

So when workers aren't at work and employers are paying the cost of that, our economy is improving with those public holidays.

It doesn't happen around the Christmas ones, but Christmas is Christmas.

Patrick's isn't too bad.

Easter is fairly neutral.

The February one is a disaster.

So I think Richard is missing a trick here, actually.

I think Richard should be going to the government looking and asking questions about the 350 million euro squander in February and looking for a change in public holidays.

I think that must be changed first before we look at additional ones.

I think every additional public holiday, it must serve everyone.

It must be fair to everyone.