Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

Does the Tánaiste agree that his legacy as Minister for Finance since 2004 is now very doubtful because of the events that occurred on his watch which, in many cases, were incited by him? I refer to the slide in house prices, largely brought about by the Minister's two botched attempts to reform the stamp duty system, and to inflation, which is running at 5%, one of the highest rates in the Union. Has the Government a strategy to deal with inflation? The number on the live register has increased by 42,000 over the past year and, next month or the month thereafter, there will be 200,000 people registered as unemployed, many of whom will have had jobs in the construction industry, which is now in decline. Exchequer returns are running at €600 million below profile for the first quarter of 2008. Most important is the Minister's amazing record of turning a surplus of €1.861 billion in the first quarter of 2007 into a deficit of €354 million in the first quarter of this year.

Does the Minister believe there will be a need for Supplementary Estimates to redress these problems? What does he propose to say to workers coping with an inflation rate of 5% as members of his Government step up to take a very large salary increase next September? The increase, amounting to €38,000, is €4,000 above the average industrial wage. As he takes up fairly awesome responsibilities on becoming Taoiseach, does the Tánaiste have a response?

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