Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)

Reference has been made to the spending on Media Lab. We know where that went. Reference has been made to the original costings of the Luas. Why do projects cost so much more than was anticipated in the first instance? What has gone wrong? Are there no pocket calculators on the Government side that they cannot work it out for themselves? Can they not get some kid in first or even second class to work out precisely where they are going wrong? Why can they not ask the questions?

The toll on the M50 is a very interesting performance. If anyone wants to know the value to the public for money from the M50, they need only observe from the toll plaza for a couple of hours any Friday. They can compare the situation there with any other country. I do not know why that has not been done or why the motorists are being punished. I do not know what they have done wrong. I do not know why somebody has not told motorists why they deserve to be punished in this fashion by this Government.

Reference has already been made to the aquatic centre. Many questions were raised in the Committee of Public Accounts before it was built because of the manner in which it was being handled. Questions were also asked about the associated leisure centre. It was all washed away, however, swept to one side in an enormous welter of consultant generated positive publicity, which is what the Government lives on. We live in a society not governed by Ministers or the Oireachtas but by the reports of consultants, of which there are many on Government shelves. Doubtless, there are more to come, but they are very costly. They will be even more costly. The one fact to emanate from all that is that there will be no Minister accountable to this House at any time in the future.

The Dublin Port tunnel is surely the laugh of all time. Before the project got under way Deputies pointed out to the then Minister for Transport that something was wrong with the plan and the tunnel was not high enough for certain trucks. Sadly, no action was taken and the result has been the recent daft intervention of the Taoiseach when he called for a ban on all trucks which cannot be accommodated in it. The reason was his desire to avoid the embarrassment of being forced to admit we built the tunnel incorrectly. The submissions I and many Deputies made provided adequate technical information to enable the Government to address the issue in good time. The reason it chose not to do so was because it no longer cares.

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