John Paul Phelan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

On regional development, Professor Barrett stated that various policies to implement regional economic development were almost akin to holding back the tide economically and that it is a difficult task. We had this discussion yesterday with Dr. McDonnell. How does one explain the differences that exist across the country? The issue I come up against quite often is that when people talk about economic development on the east coast and in Dublin, and that Dublin is doing well, they automatically speak about the need to counteract Dublin and have a counterbalance in the west, and yet my region, the south east, was the worst performing region during the boom years in terms of unemployment, third level attendance and household income. It is still the worst performing, even though employment in the south east region enjoyed the second biggest increase proportionately, but that is because it was from such a low base. Is there anything specific to the south east region or anything that can be done in this budget, if Professor Barrett were the Minister for Finance, to redress those types of imbalances?