Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

In response to the Deputy's question, I have should have said that we do our own SWITCH model internally and we look at the distributional consequences of the decisions we make. It is fair to say that this model is not at the level of sophistication of the model published by the ESRI, but the ESRI is the leader in SWITCH analyses, most particularly the recently retired Professor Tim Callan. We have a model but it does not have the full weight of the ESRI model. We will have to make many different decisions which will feed into the SWITCH analysis at the final moment.

I acknowledge the Deputy's disappointment at where we are in terms of gender proofing and equality budgeting. It would be a big ask, however, to be able to apply this to all Government expenditure. We expect to end up in line with what other countries are doing in this regard. There are approximately 90 countries carrying out this kind of work across the OECD. Austria is the leader in this field. Indeed, I met the Austrian finance Minister before I came here. The work we will bring before this committee on particular Departments will be substantial, but we have some way to go before we apply this to every cent we spend.