Mr. Robert Watt:

On the issue of procurement, nobody in the system is happy to read about the incidents the Senator mentioned, especially the most recent controversy. The point I was making is that I am not the Secretary General of that Department. Ultimately, the person who is responsible must account, as I would and as others have in the past, in terms of issues that are relevant to their responsibilities.

I agree that it presents the system in a poor light. It misrepresents what is happening because people only hear about the things that go wrong. They do not hear about all the fantastic things that are built and delivered on time. I could read out a list of them here. I had them in my briefing pack. I might share them instead. That might be better. I refer to projects that have been delivered on time and on budget. Senator Horkan will be aware from his own experience of the fantastic facilities that are being built efficiently, but there is no coverage of any of that.

It is interesting the numbers I gave on people's satisfaction with and perceptions of the Civil Service, at 70% to 80%. That is because, in effect, they are not listening to this debate. They are forming their views on the Civil Service based on their experience of dealing with the Civil Service, not what they hear on the radio or what they read in the newspapers. They do not necessarily say everything is rubbish because of that incident. They think of their personal experiences. However, it can do damage. If citizens believed what they heard and read every day, we would not be getting the type of responses back that we do when we ask them about their perceptions of the Civil Service. It would not make sense.