Olivia Mitchell (Dublin South, Fine Gael)

I join with my party leader and colleagues in deploring the contempt shown to the House and parliamentary democracy by the structure of this debate and by the level of information provided to us. Such contempt is shown again and again. Last week when we nationalised the country's third largest bank in what was probably the most important and expensive decision ever made by the House, our Taoiseach told us that we did not need to know the details because he had already made his policy decision and we could pass the Bill in the space of an afternoon.

Were I to give the Taoiseach advice, I would tell him not to confuse arrogance with leadership or stubbornness with decisiveness. Leadership and decisiveness are necessary now more than ever because they are the qualities that will inspire confidence, which is key to the economy because it will make consumers spend their money again, businesses invest and create jobs and the banks start lending again. Confidence is missing from the economy, but it is not coming from the Government.

Using the social partners as the Taoiseach's personal focus group for weeks does not inspire confidence. Instead, it creates the impression that he will do anything rather than make a decision. The people we all meet when we leave the House are in absolute despair about what will occur and about their children's futures because the man who told him that he was a safe pair of hands has been sitting on his hands since being elected. When the House broke for the summer recess, it became clear to us that a major recession was on its way. The Taoiseach was in denial about it, then published a feeble early budget hardly worthy of its name and has stayed behind the game in respect of the banks. In recent weeks, he has sat on his hands in the guise of seeking a consensus.

Recently, every computation and permutation of every possible tax, levy, freeze, cut, pension reduction, job loss, redundancy, overtime payment and so on has been trotted out and run up the flagpole to see who would salute in the hope that everyone would reach a consensus and that the Taoiseach need never make a decision on his own. It must be as obvious to every Deputy as it is to every member of the public that consensus on micro-details and precise measures will never be achieved. However, there is societal consensus in a way that was never previously the case, not only on the fact that action needs to be taken, but on what that action should be. The Taoiseach referred to resolute action, in respect of which there is a consensus.

The document under discussion by the Government and the social partners is so broad and woolly that one wonders what is being discussed. The dogs in the street know that there is consensus regarding many of the matters in question. We must take action and stop allowing ourselves to be victims of events. It is recognised that this is the moment in our history at which political leadership will make the difference between the abyss on one side and taking control of our destiny and that of our children on the other. It is not the moment for a tentative and timid Taoiseach.

There is even a consensus on the broad parameters of what must be done. While no one likes to suffer, we all know that we are facing five or ten years of austerity. The sooner we hunker down, get used to that fact and start the pain, the sooner we will come out the other end. We all know that those of us with good jobs and pensions will need to pony up more than those who are weak and vulnerable. We all know that the old sacred cows, special interests, monopolies, outmoded practices and endless agencies must be tackled mercilessly because we cannot afford or justify them. We must cut out wasteful spending and pare back current spending.

However, the measures cannot only be about what we cannot do and the spending we cannot have. There must be an investment plan that gives hope for the future, a plan that shows us from where jobs will come. The Minister of State, Deputy McGuinness, referred to the types of activity we should be doing, such as restoring competitiveness, an essential matter. He discussed the potential to drop electricity and gas prices. We all know of that potential, but why have prices not been cut? Control is on that side of the House; please, let us have those cuts. Alongside price reductions, we must also prepare to produce the goods and services that the world wants to buy from a relatively high cost and well educated economy with an efficient and productive infrastructure. We must scrap the national development plan, which was built for another world, country and future, and draft one that targets investment in emerging technologies, to which the Minister of State referred. Unfortunately, the necessary investment is not being made. I am referring to investment in broadband, energy and education, which will provide jobs in the service area.

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