Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)

Those who face a 30% hike in electricity charges cannot wait to see what kind of plan the Government will produce to manage the economy. The Government has put them in a position in which they are being stretched beyond the limit on a weekly basis. Every commuter faces rising petrol and diesel prices. Business competitiveness is drifting from us and small business and retail units are at the point of breaking down. There is no plan beyond the Taoiseach's words stating that we will manage our way through this.

I refer to the great monolith called the HSE, which the Taoiseach funded as Minister for Finance. A number of years ago, a report from Professor Drumm stated there were 2,500 too many people in the system. In recent weeks, another report has stated there are 1,000 too many in the system. The Minister for Health and Children, who also is absent from the Chamber, has stated it was premature to speculate as to the extent of redundancies or otherwise in the HSE. I wish to ask the Taoiseach a straight question in this regard. In the Taoiseach's consideration, are there sufficient numbers in the HSE or are there too many? We have very contradictory reports about this. There was an amalgamation of all the health boards involving 110,000 employees. As the Minister for Finance who funded this, and now as the Taoiseach who must preside over the "adjustments", as he calls them, are the numbers in the HSE too high or too low? Can he give the House a guarantee that we will not be faced with a series of practical problems for thousands of people because front line services are the first to get the chop due to the bureaucratic bloating that took place under his stewardship as Minister for Finance?

I listened this morning to the director of St. Michael's Hospital, who is being asked to make the choice about which children he is to leave out of his hospital.

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