Trevor Sargent (Dublin North, Green Party)

This proposal is breathtaking. It involves pages of Estimates amounting to billions of euro. I have not had a chance to add up all the Estimates, but essentially the Government is asking us, in an irresponsible way, to give the nod to expenditure without having an opportunity to vote, other than doing so once for the whole collection of Estimates. The Ceann Comhairle should consider the method of doing this in future because, currently, it indicates that we are here simply to give the nod to whatever the Government may wish to do. I was certainly not elected with that in mind, however, and it is not the mandate I received.

I strongly support Deputy Michael D. Higgins's point. Questions were raised this morning as to why the OPW had rented buildings it never used, effectively flushing €19 million down the toilet. That vast amount, however, pales into insignificance when one considers all these Estimates. It is unacceptable for these Estimates to be taken with one vote and without debate. In committee, there was a limited amount of debate but no vote was taken. This is the only place where we will vote, yet we are being asked to give the nod to all these Estimates in one fell swoop. If we do not like it, we can only vote against all the Estimates together. It is a crude version of parliamentary democracy and we could do much better. I oppose this matter.

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