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ECONOMICS: If activity in the property and construction sectors falls by 10 per cent each year and prices grow by only 5 per cent during the same period, annual tax revenues will be €1 billion less than expected and by 2012, there will be a €5 billion hole in the government's accounts.

In what has precipitated something close to a national laundry crisis, a programme on RTÉ last month asked whether the economy was facing a "future shock; property crash".