Minister of State Simon Harris told RTÉ's Today With Séan O'Rourke that Taoiseach Enda Kenny's comments about "whingers" referred to local politics and to Mr Kenny's Mayo constituency.
Mr Harris said the recovery is not complete but there has been a recovery, that it is "baloney" to say that there has not been one and that it is an insult to people to assume they do not see that there have been improvements.
Earlier, Mr Kenny said he regretted any offence that may have been taken by his comments about whingers in Castlebar at the weekend.
Speaking on local radio in Waterford this morning, Mr Kenny said he was not referring to members of the public when he made the remarks.
Describing it as "a local issue", Mr Kenny said he was referring specifically to "full time professional politicians in the Fianna Fáil party, who've constantly talked down their own town, who constantly scaremonger". He denied he was speaking about members of the public in his constituency or elsewhere in the country.
However, also on RTÉ's Today With Seán O'Rourke, Mary Lou McDonald said that Enda Kenny's comments about whingers were insulting and gave some insight into Fine Gael thinking.
The Sinn Féin deputy leader said Fine Gael had, in five years of government, failed to recognise the realities of people's lives, the housing crisis, the health service disaster and the massaging of the Live Register figures.
She added that the Taoiseach obviously takes the view that the ordinary Joe Soap should be happy with "crumbs from the rich man's table".
Speaking on the same programme, Mr Harris said that people can only judge parties on their record and he would ask the Irish public to keep a "healthy scepticism" and look at all the comments Sinn Féin has made since 2011.
He added that he knew many families have not yet felt a recovery but they would not feel any recovery under Sinn Féin.
He said Sinn Fein's tax proposals do not propose a USC reduction for anyone in the middle-earner bracket.
He said he had yet to hear Sinn Féin's plans for the cost of abolishing Irish Water or how it proposed to relocate the people currently employed by the company.
He added that it was all to play for in the final days of the election campaign.
