Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

The Taoiseach has said on a couple of occasions in reply both to this question and the previous question that new guidelines are now in place. Will he tell the House what are the guidelines, for example, in respect of overnight accommodation? Do the guidelines make it plain that the era of the €900 a night room is over and that accommodation has to be arranged on a more modest basis in terms of cost?

In view of limousine travel, for example, do our embassies in various countries not have transport facilities attached to them and to ambassadors? Is it not possible to make arrangements in order that those transport facilities might be used appropriately to ferry around visiting Ministers who are attending appropriate events? Surely it is possible to obtain appropriate transport at a lot less cost than the €9,000 arrangement we heard about for the limousine that was on stand-by.

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