Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

This is to both Ministers because there are tax profiles, which leads me to my next question. On the details of taxation, the most important issue is to have information about the costings and profiles on tax, and this point relates to the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform. All Departments make bids at various times during the year and continually regarding things they would like to do. Again, that information crystallises as the budget approaches. Does the Minister have a view as to how much of that information can be made available, if this committee is to be able to be involved in a genuine way in the budget discussion?

As for my final question to the Minister for Finance, I have a practical example. While budget discussions of Estimates are taking place in the Dáil today, Members were not able to get the Estimates until approximately one hour ago. As the Ministers are aware, it is quite tricky to have a detailed analysis on a sectoral basis, and today's debate will be on health and education. Will the Minister give an undertaking or explain why there has been such a mess in respect of the Estimates this year?. It is almost six months into the financial year and all that information is available, certainly up to the end of May. Why is this information and the information on the other Estimates not available?

My final question is on the relationship with the European Union and the Minister might talk to members about this matter at a subsequent stage. At present in the European Union, there is a build-up of different rules for different countries. This is because although there is a general EU fiscal framework, to which the Minister referred in his opening remarks, and a fiscal space, it increasingly is being interpreted in different ways for different countries. Does the Minister have a view because with the budgetary oversight committee, the EU fiscal framework obviously is a significant issue? If the rules keep being changed, will the Minister provide a mechanism to update members on his view of the current approach by the EU structures to Ireland, that is, whether we would get the same leeway as or less leeway than France? I do not expect the Minister to answer all of that now, but if this committee is to do its job in the context of budget scrutiny, its members must get a sense of the current position of the EU and ECOFIN, in that France now gets two extra years, Spain certainly got one extra year, I believe Portugal also got an extra year and so on.