Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)

The Minister is right to treat with contempt the interrogation of Fianna Fáil on the reasons why we are in this disastrous situation. Is it not the case that the Government's decision to adhere to the EU-IMF austerity programme, continuing with the public sector recruitment embargo, is not leading to reform but towards a slaughtering of public services? The figures in education indicate 1,400 jobs garnered gone out of the education sector when 10,000 extra children come into the primary schools every year. This amounts to a savage assault on our education system where services are giving way.

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