Paul Gogarty (Dublin Mid West, Green Party)

We can go into the past and point to the macroeconomic decisions made by a previous Administration and the political consensus that existed at the time. We can speak about the lack of an apology for mistakes made or the relationship between builders, bankers, speculators, developers and donations to councillors throughout the country that led to and exacerbated the property bubble. We can speak about the lack of leadership shown by various political parties through their unwillingness to break the link by refusing to take donations from corporations, businesses and trade unions. However, time is limited and reality faces us.

We can speak all we want about the merits of dragging out our pain beyond 2014, even allowing for the extra interest payments we would have to make. However, the reality is that those poorly regulated monsters, the ratings agencies, which have called it wrong for Ireland before and will continue to do so, through the power they have been given to hold us by the throat. We made a commitment to our European partners and the European Central Bank to cut our deficit to 3% by 2014. Therefore, to give us a chance to retain what is left of our economic sovereignty we need to introduce a tough budget and front-load it with a balance rightly struck between taxation and cuts. It is a case of slash our wrists or someone will come in and stab us in the heart. Unfortunately, that is not much of a choice. We have a moral as well as a political duty to try to introduce the best budget and best four-year plan possible.

I stated previously that people need to be afraid - very afraid - lest we continue to believe the fantasy economics of those who can afford to hurl from the ditch and say we can stretch it out. This does not mean that as a country we cannot prevail. I believe we can and will get out of this mire. We have done it before and we will do it again. We are a creative and resourceful people. With our export sector continuing to thrive, our agricultural development and our tourism potential we have many jewels in the crown. Most of all, we have our people and their continuing high standard of education, a standard which I must emphasise needs to be maintained.

As Deputy Trevor Sargent stated, in getting through this period we need to be wary of the looming challenges of peak oil and climate change. Peak oil means the global standard of living faces a decline with energy shortages and massive increases in energy prices. We need to prepare for this decline in economic activity and live in a sustainable way. This recession is our opportunity. As a country, we are closer to Spain and Portugal than Germany but we borrowed from German pensioners to max out our credit cards. We can no longer do this. The price of imported fuel will continue to rise from a current price of €6 billion. We need to be able to produce that energy in this country and to store it as fuel to power transport vehicles, heat our homes and export it in order to create an extra revenue source. This is the future way forward, along with agriculture and technology.

The Green Party is prepared to make the tough budget decisions and to do the right thing but the budget still has to be fair and it must be seen to be fair and we must show political leadership. On previous occasions I have called for pay cuts for Deputies and Ministers and I do so again. We also need to scrap the ministerial mercs as soon as possible, reallocate the Garda drivers back into working on the ground and create a pool of junior ministerial drivers. I acknowledge that Ministers need to work while travelling and they cannot be driving; it is very difficult to work and drive. I suggest a pool of drivers to drive Ministers in the Minister's own vehicles. This would send a message that we are not the elite. It appalled me to see Ministers driving into Farmleigh in their mercs as it sent out the wrong message. I, for one, do not agree with it. We need to show leadership. We need to show leadership and vision.

We must protect education. In the programme for Government the Green Party secured major reversals in education cuts and the protection of the education budget at a very difficult time last year. This time there is significant pressure to slash and burn the education budget. This is a regressive step that will cost us hundreds of millions of euro over the years. Finland invested in education during a time of recession. It is a country with a similar population to Ireland and now it is reaping the rewards of that investment. Accepting the pressures to front-load, we must admit it is impossible to avoid a hit on education but the Department of Education and Skills must be seen to perform better than every other Department. In that context, the Minister for Finance, the Minister for Education and Skills and the Taoiseach, must know that some areas are sacrosanct to the Green Party. Capitation must be maintained and the extra teachers promised must be provided. Language support and special needs must be protected. The delivery of school buildings and capital projects cannot be slashed too much as this will affect job creation and make the situation worse.

We must keep teachers in the schools. Education is the way forward. It will reap an economic benefit and therefore it needs to be protected.

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