Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)

Some €50 million is still a lot of money for a lot of organisations. The difficulty is that we do not have detail. The saving has been included in the budget documentation in order to specify an amount.

We spoke at length in the House on septic tank legislation. It is an attack on rural Ireland. I live in a town and do not have a septic tank, therefore I will not have to pay the charge or fine that may be imposed because of what I did 30 years ago which was correct at the time, but it will affect those in rural areas.

Of the 31 Garda stations to be closed, although some are in Dublin city, the majority are in rural areas. It is easier in a city for other gardaí to cover an area than it is for gardaí to travel, for example, from Castlebar to Tourmakeady, where I was yesterday, which is 40 minutes from Castlebar. Yet when an incident occurs we expect a garda to be on the scene without delay.

We are not intent on splitting the country with this motion. Rather, we are pointing out that the emphasis of this budget is anti-rural, as is the emphasis of Government policy to date. In pointing that out, we hope the Government will rectify it for 2012. We hope those around the Cabinet table will be more conscious of the impact of these policies. When they impose a reduction of €50 million, which is detailed as an "efficiency", or produce a school staffing schedule which will increase class sizes from 12 to 20 by 2014, they should be cognisant of the specific effect of such changes on rural areas.

That is why we are taking this opportunity to raise these issues, and I commend Deputy Moynihan on bringing forward the motion. We do so constructively. I was four years on the other side of the House and saw how those in government behaved. In fairness, the Minister, Deputy Howlin, as Leas-Cheann Comhairle, was not part of the chorus led by his party leader, the Tánaiste, which damned every decision taken by the last Government. The language became increasingly apoplectic as the years went on, with the Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Joan Burton, being the lead cheerleader. To point out that the Government is now getting a dose of its own medicine is not constructive, but its members delivered that treatment for four years. We are asking the Government, when we come back in 2012, to bear in mind that decisions taken in the first nine months of its term have weighed disproportionately on rural Ireland.

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