Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the witnesses. Mr. Tutty's final comment was very helpful. Yesterday, we had a reasonable example of what happens, the Department of Finance telephoned about an hour before the release of the document. We were invited to the Department of Finance. Those of us who read the newspapers or engage in social media had the privilege of reading a summary and commentary on it. I do not know how constrained the officials are in the Department, I know they are present, but other than getting the actual document on which there was an embargo of one hour into our hands, I did not see any particular usefulness to the exercise.

As I understand it, but I may be incorrect, the budgetary oversight committee is to have a role in the scrutiny, and is to be in a position to do some analysis in a summary way, of the information flows on a timely basis. It would be very useful if we had details of the Irish budget, similar to the way on a previous occasion the German Bundestag had details of the Irish budget, which shocked people in this country, but was entirely routine in Germany. How do we arrive at a position where as the committee develops, we are provided with the documentation and information that we can then analyse on the basis that we have been discussing? That would be very helpful.

I think it applies as much to capital expenditure as to current expenditure. Having come out of a very difficult period and moving into recovery and an expansionary period, how do we get quality information on how the capital spend is going? The Fiscal Council of Ireland does the medium-term forecast. We need information flows as that is very important in how the economy grows.