Marc Ó Cathasaigh (Waterford, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

Go raibh maith agat, a Aire, as ucht do chur i láthair. I will repeat myself and acknowledge the great effort of staff in the Department, the Minister and her predecessor, Senator Regina Doherty. What jumped out at me from the Minister’s presentation at the end were the figures of 23 million payments and more than 10 million calls answered: they are astounding numbers.

I invite members to raise any issues with her about the Estimate on a programme-by-programme basis. I request that members indicate what programme they are referring to from the outset. As we have a relatively small number of members in attendance, we will have multiple opportunities so we can give the Minister a chance to answer rather than over-egging it with questions from the off.