Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail)

I take on board what the Chair said about parliamentary questions. I am happy to answer the questions asked here. I will reflect on what he said and I will mention it. On the Garda Síochána, I am not going to go back and forth with the Chair here today on it. It is a challenging thing to do. The funding is in place for 1,000 recruits a year and I am committed to trying to get the figure up there. If I fail, I have no doubt that people will bring it to my attention. I am not at this stage prepared to say I am giving up on it.

Turning to the immigrant investor programme, the logic of it being introduced in 2013 can be understood when there was a real financial crisis in the country. Fortunately, we have now recovered remarkably well from that economic downturn. The Chair is right in terms of his assessment of the applicants for the programme. People thought applicants would be coming from different parts of the world. The reason people were funding it was because of the benefit they got from Irish residency. There was no ambiguity about that. The only reason people from America, China or any other part of the world were investing was not out of any great love of Carrickmacross but because they wanted to get the benefit of residency. It had its time and I am glad it has stopped. There are still going to be applications coming through the process, and I approve them. There is an assessment board in the Department that evaluates them and then they come to me. I generally adopt the recommendations made to me by the evaluation committee. I am not planning to carry out a review of the programme. In many respects, it has been taking up too much time in the Department. I want to see it end and for us to move on. I am not going to spend time going back over it.