Richard O'Donoghue (Limerick County, Independent Ireland Party)

If we had a template from one to ten across the board where there had been overruns in, for example, health infrastructure, and we came back here next year for our pre-budget meeting, we could stand in this room and say we were here last year and this is where we were at. This year, we have adopted something. We cannot fix it all overnight. Anyone who thinks he or she can is a fool. However, we can start to make an improvement whether in health, infrastructure or housing. We can say next year that we have brought this down by 10%. For any place where there is a design and delivery contract and it comes in under budget, there should be a reward. You get a lot more with honey than vinegar. Let us say contractors are given 20 kilometres of road or motorway to deliver.

If they deliver that before time, there is a reward system put in there, so there is an incentive to get it done on budget, on time - or before time. Again, we get it delivered on budget, on time, and the reward system comes in for that. If we come back here next year and can go across the board and hear, "Listen, Richard, we are after reducing this by 5%; we are on the right trajectory; next year, we hope to get it down by 10%", we will then be on a trajectory where we can all work together to make sure that when we leave these committee rooms in however many years it takes and we have the health to do so, there will be someone of the next generation sitting behind the witnesses who will be sitting up here to carry on the legacy of what we have delivered. If we can deliver accountability, that is what we need to deliver to make sure there is a future for those people who are sitting behind the witnesses.