Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)

This will be my last opportunity ever to address the House on the Estimates and I wish to use my time wisely. I am somewhat disturbed at what we heard from the Minister for Education and Science. She began by telling us what a great person she was. She appears to believe the country only began in 1997. Everything about which we hear from members of the Government dates back to 1997, based on which we constantly hear of comparisons. How quickly we forget. If one goes back a further ten years, a Minister from the same party as the Minister for Education and Science was the only Minister in the history of the State to disimprove the pupil-teacher ratio but she has forgotten all about it.

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