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Volume 8 1945~1948

Doc No.
Date
Subject

No. 460 NAI DT S13201A

Memorandum for the Government by the Department of Finance
'The International Monetary Fund and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development'

Dublin, 24 December 1947

  1. The Minister for Finance circulated to the Government, for its information, on the 10th October, 1944, a memorandum which had been prepared by the Governor of the Central Bank, outlining the purposes and implications for this country of the Articles of Agreement of the International Monetary Fund and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development drawn up at Bretton Woods. No decision was then sought on the question of joining either institution.
  2. On the 29th September last a further memorandum was circulated giving the Government the latest information on the operations of both Fund and Bank,1 which had commenced business earlier in the year, and recommending that inquiries should be made as to the amount of the quota which would be assigned to this country if it became a member of the International Monetary Fund and of the Bank for International Reconstruction and Development. Since then the Governor of the Central Bank has been in consultation with British interests in the Bank and Fund and has, at the request of the Minister for Finance, furnished him with memoranda on the desirability or otherwise of this country's joining the Fund and/or the Bank.
  3. These memoranda are circulated for the information of the Government and the Minister for Finance concurs with the recommendation of the Governor of the Central Bank that this country should become a member of the International Monetary Fund and by implication of the Bank for International Reconstruction and Development and recommends accordingly to the Government subject to our quota and share allocations respectively not being unreasonable and also provided that membership of either body is not made dependent on any conditions that would be seriously unsatisfactory.2

1 See above No. 422.

2 Ireland ultimately joined the IMF and the IBRD in 1957.

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