Professor John FitzGerald:

This is very important in terms of investment. Research done by the ESRI showed that the third level sector - this was done about 15 years ago - that universities had done a reasonable job of trying to improve their energy efficiency but the institutes of technology had done a lousy job. Why? The Department of Education and Skills controlled their budget. They did not have a capital budget and unless they saved the full cost of the energy efficiency investment within the one year they were not allowed to proceed.

Twenty years ago the headmaster of the school that my children attended sent me the school's electricity bill for two years. He had halved the bills because he had found a mechanism for hiding the money from the Department of Education and Skills and used the money to make furniture for the school. Therefore, how we assess the capital budget is really important. The State needs to spend, and has allocated in the NDP, a lot of money but spending money efficiently is essential.