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

The Government will claim there is a greater degree of openness and transparency in the budgetary process. The spring economic statement, part of the EU fiscal rules, is indeed welcome. However, in recent years the budgetary process presented in Dáil Éireann is less honest and less accurate with no meaningful review mechanism in place. Last year, the Government announced additional expenditure on budget day of €429 million. Today, we learn that on top of that, there is now an additional €1.5 billion available for Supplementary Estimates. This money has to be spent in a rush before the end of this year. This has happened every single year with this Government. Why is it the Government makes two and a half times more cash available for the last two months of the year compared to what was available for the first ten months? We are expecting Supplementary Estimates of approximately €600 million for health, €400 million for social protection, €100 million for transport and €50 million for education, along with other Supplementary Estimates that have yet to be finalised. There is something wrong with a budgetary process where two and a half times more money is available in the Supplementary Estimates at the end of the year than there was by way of additional expenditure in the budget at the beginning of the year.

This mismanagement of our finances has contributed to the crisis in the health service. No honest health Estimate has been provided in the lifetime of this Government. Every year, it deliberately understates the figures, resulting in the health service being starved of vital funds and then a splash of cash at the end of the year. This is no way to plan a health service, let alone any service. The taxpayer would get better value for money if it was made available on a planned basis throughout the course of the year and operations and appointments could be planned in an orderly manner rather than what we are experiencing now.

Today, the Government announced additional expenditure of approximately €750 million. Based on all its previous budgets, this figure is neither accurate nor honest. The only question is how much there will be by way of Supplementary Estimates towards the end of 2016. I know the Ministers opposite will argue EU rules do not allow that. EU rules can be renegotiated, which the Government did earlier this year in regard to changing the ten-year rule for increasing expenditure. These rules are not set in concrete but are flexible, depending on each member state’s individual situation.

See this speech in context