At such a tumultuous time for Irish society, I jumped at the chance to sit down with an international expert and hear his views on us. Stewart Binnie, president of Aurora Fashions, has sat on more than 30 company boards as chairman, chief executive and non-executive director. In his career, which has spanned more than three decades, Binnie has led companies in retail, media and financial services. The model that entices Binnie to get involved in any venture is one which offers him a role in the business, presents him with an investment opportunity, and requires his skills, knowledge and experience.

In the last eight years, Binnie has overseen massive changes in Aurora, firstly coming on board as chairman of Oasis before it evolved into Mosaic, with its seven brands, and became Aurora Fashions following the banking crisis of 2007. "I met Derek Lovelock in 2002 when I joined the board of Oasis as chairman. At the time, Derek was the CEO of Oasis and a few loss-making Coast stores. Derek had the vision to position Coast as a specialist occasion-wear brand," he said. "We developed it by way of department-store concessions and standalone stores in Britain and Ireland. It was especially strong in Ireland and is now growing internationally. Thereafter, the company acquired other brands, some of which, such as Karen Millen and Warehouse, have grown enormously."

In 2006, Binnie was appointed chairman of fashion brand Lipsy, where he was instrumental in converting the wholesale label into a retail brand which specialised in young occasion wear. Eventually the brand migrated from department-store concessions to standalone stores. Lipsy was sold to Next in 2008.

Since April 2010, Binnie has been chairman of fashion brand Jane Norman, which is currently opening department-store concessions and standalone stores in northern Europe. "Jane Norman is a very profitable label in Britain. We have introduced it to Europe and now have over 150 department-store concessions there with many others planned," he said.

Binnie moved into book publishing and retail after two years at the London Business School. He spent five years as the managing director of Hatchards bookshops, which grew from a single branch in Piccadilly to 30 branches under his direction. He then spent three years as chairman of Helicon Publishing, followed by eight years in senior buying and marketing roles in WH Smith.

Binnie explained the steps that led him into the realm of private equity. "The view was that because I had built up a retail business I could do the same for others. I approached the move into private equity with some scepticism but the rewards were potentially enormous. But investment skills and business development skills are entirely different. Only now do I feel I have integrated them successfully. I became a partner of Permira, one of Britain's largest private equity funds, specialising in retail, media and financial service investments. I think the company saw that I got retail and I had an understanding of retail issues."

He now advises Schroders and SVG on private-equity matters, is chairman of the Schroder Ventures Asia Pacific Fund and a member of Schroders' private equity fund.

Moving on to discuss the current state of Ireland, Binnie relates our situation to Britain's recession at the beginning of the 1990s. "Britain and most western economies boomed in the late 1980s. This was followed by a huge, unanticipated recession at the turn of the decade. It took several years for Britain to emerge from this setback and for the economy to grow again. There was a slump in house prices, massive lay-offs in manufacturing and the value of the pound dropped sharply. Britain had been in the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) and when the chancellor of the exchequer of the day, Norman Lamont, announced the pound was exiting, the ERM interest rates soared to 18%. They were dark days – reminiscent, in many respects, of how the Irish public is feeling now."

I asked Binnie if he had seen any cause for optimism in Britain back then. He said at the time he was in private equity "and was sitting on the board of several companies at death's door. Britain pulled out of its dire straits because its currency had been devalued. One consequence was an export-led recovery, a solution Ireland has denied itself by virtue of its membership of the single currency. Without devaluation, Ireland's transition to solvency will be all the harder."

Binnie reflected on how else the Irish government could have played its cards. "Prior to the arrival of the IMF, the Irish government arrived at the worst possible solution – behaving as if the IMF was present without giving investors the confidence they might have had if the IMF and the European Central Bank had actually been in control of the situation. On top of that, it instilled fear in the public and the bond markets by instigating successive rounds of public expenditure cuts without having a banking solution in place. Greece, by contrast, swallowed its medicine from a bottle with an IMF and ECB label and has achieved a degree of stability which might endure."

He shares German chancellor Angela Merkel's view that highly indebted countries such as Ireland should restructure their debts without huge economic and social costs. "New lending should come from the IMF and the ECB. Existing lenders should bear some of the costs of their profligacy. Were Ireland a public or private company, it would look to renegotiate with the banks the coupon on its debt, its repayment schedule, the security it offered and the value of the principal subject to repayment."

In Binnie's view, it is self-evident that Ireland will not be able to meet its debts. He believes that "the international community knows that but is loath to admit it".

Ian Galvin is chairman of Aurora Ireland