So Ireland has asked you for a loan of about £7 billion – roughly the same amount due to be axed from the public purse. Does this make you angry? asks Jason Lavan.

I am Irish. I came to England five years ago to pursue a career in journalism.

When I left, the country was still going from strength to strength. We were the envy of Europe.

Microsoft’s second largest operation in the world was in Ireland.

We had one of the best social welfare systems in the Western world.

Everyone from pop stars to movie stars, billionaires and snap happy tourists flooded into the green land to get a taste of modern Irish life.

Five years on we are bust and having to borrow £77bn from other EU nations, including £7bn from the English, with whom we fought so hard to get our beloved republic.

The pride in one’s country never leaves you, but neither does it prevent you from feeling embarrassed.

There is much in the media about how it happened, why it happened and what is going to happen next.

But the human side to all of this has been largely missed.

As I sat in the newsroom in Ketley and watched the top news item on the BBC pop up, “Irish bailout”…”UK to lend £7billion to Ireland…” the embarrassment, disappointment and anger began to set in.

For a country of only four million people we had the world at our fingertips.

An extremely proud nation, Ireland had to fight hard for everything it got and the days of mass hardship appeared to be over.

It was embarrassing seeing the country you love forced to knock on David Cameron’s front door with our hand out.

It was also embarrassing to think that the people we elected to look after our public finances failed miserably to put measures in place for some kind of sustainability.

It was never thought at home that the boom was going to last. It was thought that it would calm down to some degree and it would level out.

But it was never thought we would be where we are now.

I am extremely patriotic and proud of everything the country has achieved in times gone by, but while I continued to watch the news I felt a great disappointment towards my fellow Irishmen at home.

Why are they not protesting en masse?

Why are thousands of people not forcing down the gates of the Dáil (Irish Parliament) and getting the bankers to hold a press conference and finally face the nation?

I am disappointed at the lack of appetite for accountability. It is all to easy to point the finger at the politicians, who we can kick out come January anyway.

But where are the bankers?

They are taking another £36 billion of this bailout.

Why are they not frogmarched out of their offices to face the Irish people?

The anger begins to set in because we had it all and blew it – big style.

We are now paying for the mistakes of the banking community who borrowed far more than our modest country was ever worth and the people who made these decisions are nowhere to be found.

The mood in the country is, as you can imagine, pretty dour.

When I call home it is usually the first thing we speak about but, I feel there is now almost a slight sense of relief that we cannot fall much further.

I sense that it might be coming to an end, despite the hardship of the impending cuts and tax hikes.

But one thing is certain. It will take more than embarrassment, disappointment and anger to kill the Irish spirit.

Despite the economic gloom that many of my family and friends now face, a phone call to my brother Michael reminded me why I love being Irish and, possibly, why the Irish are so loved.

I asked him about the mood in the country and he said: “Ah sure, we’ll session through the recession.”