THEY SAID. . .

"The budgetary position will take a number of years to correct."

- Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan after the latest exchequer returns show tax revenue fell by 23 per cent in the first quarter while the economy was due to shrink by 6.75 per cent.


"It is not about leadership. It's about the enormity of the challenge and the uncertainty of what's going to happen with the banking system in particular."

- Standard & Poor's director of European sovereign ratings Frank Gill explains he had not meant to question the State's leadership when he spoke of the need for 'new faces in Government'.

"The agreement begins to crack down on the cowboys in financial markets that have brought global markets undone with real impact on jobs everywhere."

- Australian prime minister Kevin Rudd at the G20 summit

"It's a plan to rearrange the deck chairs and hope that that keeps us from hitting the iceberg."

- Paul Krugman, columnist and Nobel laureate, expressing his skepticism of the financial-rescue plan unveiled by US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner

"What we’ve worked for, for 25 years, can be gone in 25 days. That’s how fast this is moving."

- Bob Vistinar, General Motors employee, on the company's efforts to reconcile its restructuring with union contracts

"We anticipate the ongoing contraction in economic activity will worsen this year before a policy-induced recovery gradually builds through 2010."

– OECD