Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The Deputy had better make up his mind. One day he accuses us of following the Fianna Fáil programme to the letter and states we should not get any credit for it because it is all Fianna Fáil's doing while the next he is saying it is a programme Fianna Fáil wants to completely disown and it has nothing to do with it. In truth, it is neither. We renegotiated the programme with the troika. We are on a trajectory to get our deficit below 3%. We will still borrow €8 billion this year to pay for our services and this is a huge burden because we are piling up further debt. We want to minimise this by having a balanced budget as quickly as we can, consistent with making rational decisions.

It is as though one could make the level of budgetary adjustments the people have been obliged to endure and have endured without affecting any social welfare, health or education services. As the Deputy knows full well, the four Departments of Health, Social Protection, Education and Skills and Justice and Equality between them account for 87% of all current expenditure and it would be impossible to make those adjustments.

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