Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Minister has skirted around the fact that the 2014 Supplementary Estimate of €1.2 billion is the single biggest Supplementary Estimate in the history of the State. It was nearly matched by the Supplementary Estimate of €1.1 billion in 2012. The two biggest Supplementary Estimates since the foundation of the State have been presented since the Department of Public and Expenditure and Reform was established. The Minister and his Department have done damage to the Estimates process. In the past four years they have failed to perform their basic function of presenting a proper book of Estimates and to live within them. The Minister has rightly acknowledged that the Department of Finance bailed him out. In hindsight, given his record and that of his Department, it might have been a mistake to split the Department of Finance in two. When that Department was responsible for expenditure, as well of taxation, we never had such a gross level of wrong Estimates presented on budget day.

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