Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Performance budgeting is something we introduced over the last two years, beginning with some Departments, and it now applies across all Departments. When a Department presents the expenditure subhead, it also indicates what the subhead is for and the expected outcomes. At the end of the year the relevant committee, be it the health committee or the education committee, analyses it. It is not simply an accounting mechanism to say the money was spent on the budget. It is to show whether the Department got what it intended and to get an analysis of what it intended.