Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)

I could not believe my ears when listening to Deputy Flanagan earlier. He said that we need additional resources in the area of justice. At the time I had in front of me the pre-budget document Fine Gael published. On page 19 the party advocated freezing the voted Exchequer current spending for 2009 at 2008 levels, and then looked for 3% savings in every Department. How could we deal with the situation by introducing cuts as drastic as those advocated by Fine Gael? My Department has to live with a cut of 2%, yet Fine Gael is asking for more than 3%, even though it wants Exchequer spending frozen at 2008 levels.

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