Olwyn Enright (Laois-Offaly, Fine Gael)

No one would disagree with the importance of fraud control measures in the Department and the Minister has my support in her efforts to tackle the problem of social welfare fraud. Our views diverge, however, on the notion that €59 million is slightly under target. The Taoiseach would be a happy man if he believed he could find another €59 million before entering the Chamber at 4 p.m. It is not acceptable for the Minister to state she met the €25 million target announced in July when the overall projected savings were not achieved.

This returns us to the lack of forward planning in the Department and my previous question on the lengths of queues in social welfare offices. If the Government had shown a little foresight and anticipated the increase in unemployment, it would not have been necessary to transfer social welfare inspectors, whose function is to tackle fraud, to dealing with dole queues. How many social welfare inspectors were transferred? How much of the €59 million shortfall in projected savings from social welfare fraud measures can be ascribed to the need to transfer social welfare inspectors from anti-fraud activity to dealing with lengthening dole queues and the Department's failure to appoint and train staff?

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