Liam Twomey (Wexford, Fine Gael)

I do not believe the Tánaiste's statement that she would try to avoid accountancy terms in her contribution. The credibility of the Government is on the line in this matter. Before Christmas the Tánaiste announced a surplus of €1.6 million, when that was due to over-taxation of the people, something the Government got wrong in regard to the economy in general. We are now hearing that the Government is not spending taxpayers' money properly. The Tánaiste might say it makes no difference as this money was for the HSE. However, there was a major problem between current and capital spending.

In December we were told that €12 million was overspent on the current side. This has now jumped to €56 million to balance the books between current and capital spending. This is otherwise known as creative accounting, which is what has happened.

It was expected that €56 million would be left over from capital spending by the end of 2005, which is 10% of the capital budget that the former health boards and the HSE have tried to keep back every year for the past six or seven years to carry over into the following year. The figure allowed to be carried forward was 10%.

The HSE got it wrong on the current side of its spending. It overspent by €50 million and the Tánaiste is now trying to rejig matters in January so that it does not really matter whether the money is spent as current or capital, so long as the money is spent. Commentators from the Department of Health and Children and the HSE's Financial Officer were not sure whether the money was missing, had been spent or so forth. We have heard this over the past 24 hours. The matter seems to have suddenly exploded from out of nowhere and, for some reason, we are getting the information now.

What happened last June when the Department of Finance wrote to the Department of Health and Children to say it was unhappy with the practice of spending money dedicated to capital projects on current day to day spending? Was the Tánaiste informed in June that this was going on? What happened between June and December or January that meant the Tánaiste did not know about this issue until two weeks ago? This is bad practice when one spends €12 billion per year. It is bad practice for the HSE, the Accounting Officers and the Minister responsible for managing the taxpayers'€12 billion spent on health services. More issues will come out.

Mr. Kevin Kelly told us at the beginning of 2005 that he would need an extra €200 million if he were to deliver his corporate plan in 2005. We saw what happened, that is, cutbacks in services and home help hours in 2005. Services were not delivered until the end of 2005. This is the next problem we must begin exploring in respect of how Governments spend their money. How much is spent towards the end of the year? How much capital and current spending occurs at a profound rate in the HSE in order for people to balance the bottom line? It is not about the delivery of services or proper accountability, rather balancing the bottom line for the Tánaiste to tell the House that there was no problem. This year, there was clearly a problem and someone made a serious mistake. The Tánaiste does not know what is happening within the service.

We should get a clearer statement from the Department's Accounting Officers if they are keeping the Tánaiste informed on what is happening. It would be important for her. When the Tánaiste stood in this Chamber to debate the Health Act 2004 establishing the HSE, she said there were two reasons for proposing the legislation and two ways in which Government policies should be judged, namely, better outcomes for patients and better value for taxpayers' money. We do not know whether we are getting better value with this sort of carry on, when money is put aside for capital projects. The Tánaiste seems to be saying that this 10% is nothing more than a slush fund if a booboo is made on the current day to day spending in the health services.

As Deputy Kenny pointed out this morning, we do not know how many people work for the HSE or where millions of taxpayers' money is being spent. I often hear anecdotal information about end of year spending and how health authorities run out to buy computers, televisions and pieces of equipment that they are not sure they need. We never know whether this really happens as it is very difficult to trawl through the accounts to determine what is happening unless someone tells us what is going on.

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