Averil Power (Fianna Fail)
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I thank the witnesses for their presentations. Their point is well made in terms of the necessity for equality budgeting in the context of the broader social consequences of budgetary measures and, in particular, their longer-term impacts. I was very strongly opposed to the proposal last year to take teachers out of DEIS schools, a decision that was subsequently and rightly overturned. When we asked the departmental officials who came before the committee whether they had thought through the longer-term economic consequences of this proposal, not only for education but also in the areas of justice, social housing and so on, their answers were not reassuring. There should be a requirement when decisions such as this are being made that consideration be given to the consequences across all sectors, particularly in the longer term, in order to ascertain whether the particular measure really does represent value for money. There have been several cases, including cuts to drugs projects and so on, in which individual Departments took account only of their own budgets, with no consideration for the knock-on consequences on a broader scale. That is a deeply dysfunctional approach.

Reference was made to the Minister of State, Deputy Sean Sherlock, heading up a committee on social enterprise. I do not have any information on how well that committee, which I understand was established in July 2013, is working and whether there have been any outcomes from its deliberations. Has it indicated, for example, that it will accept all of the recommendations from Forfás? I accept it is early days in the committee's operation, but I am interested to hear what progress has been made.

An interesting point was made about the need to ensure business students are educated about the non-profit sector and social enterprise. How many of the colleges provide that type of training? I am aware that Trinity College does, or certainly did in the past - in my final year there I did a course in managing voluntary organisations. Only a small minority of students would have taken that course, but it was an excellent offering. I do not know whether other business schools and faculties take a similar approach. Some of the basic principles of business are the same across all sectors, but in the case of social enterprise the overall perspective is totally different. It is important to ensure that all business graduates have at least some understanding of what is involved in working in the third sector.