James Lawless (Kildare North, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I am sure the Minister of State wants to get there as well. It is frustrating and all figures are relative but we have declined in three of the five targets and stayed still in the others. The Minister of State has accepted we are not anywhere near the 2.5% of GNP target that the Government set as a target. Effectively, he is echoing what the Taoiseach said when I asked him about this late last year. He said there were other areas, including housing and health, competing for funding. That would be fine if it was not the Government that set the target. The Government set about putting in place Innovation 2020 as a plan for innovation; it was launched by the Government but it has not met the goals and is now saying there are other priorities. I am just getting mixed messages. Is the Innovation 2020 target of 2.5% of GNP still Government policy and what steps are in place to get there? When will we reach that?