Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)

One of the reasons it is the worst Administration in 40 years is that it consists of a Cabinet of individuals. There is no coherence, competence or leadership in Cabinet at the moment. That is the reason for absent Minister after absent Minister speaking about increasing the top rate of income tax and bringing in domestic water charges when 43% of the treated water in the country is flowing away through pipes underground. Ministers float personal musings about introducing third-level fees when the Government has screwed an entire young generation for capital gains tax and stamp duty on their houses. It now expects them to pay for their future also.

This Government has turned into a Cabinet of kite flyers and wasters. It is nothing more or less than the worst Administration in 40 years.

The lack of regulation from the Central Bank and the Financial Regulator when banks were throwing out money prolifically left, right and centre has been pointed out time and again. I have been in houses which young people have built for a fortune and furnished to the gills. On top of the mortgage they throw in the BMW and SUV. We even now have cases where credit cards have been exhausted and transferred on to a mortgage, with a subsequent increase in repayments.

The level of personal debt in this country will take years to filter through the system. The lack of comprehension that it could not last was fostered by Fianna Fáil with the idea that the good times would never end and the party would last forever. The Government failed absolutely and fundamentally to do its constitutional and political duty by having a country efficiently run with value for money.

Why does it take a recession for Fianna Fáil to indicate it must do something about the public service? It is five years since we were down in Killarney and I stated that if €1 billion extra was to be paid in benchmarking, we should ensure a return in increased efficiency and better service for the people from that money. That choice was never taken up and the Fine Gael Party was scoffed at for issuing these warnings. We repeatedly offered warnings on social partnership and the dangerous trend emerging of the entire economy being built on the back of the property boom.

In government, Fianna Fáil would not listen and we are now expected to row in with the Government on all issues. This example of a bipartisan approach which the Government sought on cancer services and so many other issues was not evident this week when it would not even have a debate on the economic circumstances in which our people now find themselves.

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