Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

I do not have to apply my standards to anyone else. The standards are simply applied as appropriate in line with the regulations. I have always used these facilities on the basis of official visits or official work. As I said, the workload for officeholders both at home and abroad is such that on many occasions obtaining a scheduled flight place is not an option, particularly due to the times involved, with many meetings held in the evening and so on. Other work is ongoing during the course of the day, including coming to and being answerable to this House. When one leaves for a meeting abroad, there may be criticism as to why one is not still at home, answering questions, having probably done so for an hour or two that morning.

One cannot win. The bottom line is that one has to do the job that has been assigned to one to the best of one's ability, using the facilities as appropriate, and obviously being mindful of the cost effectiveness of these issues where long flights and other flights can be accommodated by scheduled arrangements with normal aircraft, which are often used, as I have indicated.

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