Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

As I hear the Minister's explanation and I look at this sub-head I am not happy with his explanation. It is not satisfactory and it does not satisfactorily explain the allocation of €6.5 million for consultants. To put it in context, if he were to employ full-time economists at €100,000 a year he could get 65 of them. He would not need 65; the expertise of many of them would cross over a number of these sub-heads. When the Minister used the analogy that he would not employ a full-time painter to paint his house he was right but we are not talking about a house. We are talking about an economy and given the amount of money he finds he now has to allocate for outside expertise to be brought in, the cost of that is so high it is self-evident from the amounts involved that the Minister needs full-time economists employed in the Department, which would be better value for money than what is before us. I do not see how the Minister could argue anything else.