Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

A lot of people might have a question about the performance of the Government regarding this issue. There is a lot of talk about data and evidence and all of that. That all shows that what is being done at the moment is not working. I do not know why we continue just fooling ourselves that the approach is effective. I make that comment.

I want to get onto the issue of funding for local drugs task forces, which is the purpose of this meeting. We were presented earlier with figures showing that over the last 12 years there has been a welcome increase in overall Government expenditure, there has been a very substantial increase in overall health expenditure but when it comes to funding of the drugs task forces, we are actually devoting less funding to them now than we did in 2012. I think it is about 4.5% less and that is not even adjusted for inflation, which is about 28%. How does the Minister of State defend the fact that the local structures responding to the drugs issue are being underfunded relative to 12 years ago?