Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I refer to the distress caused by this Government in the areas of health and housing. It is really shocking to read the figures in relation to the Department of Health where yet again the Government has introduced a Supplementary Estimate plus other funding of almost €500 million. The Minister for Health has failed to fulfil his responsibility. Despite the fact that the total expenditure on health is now around €17 billion, the Government seems to lack the competence to address the services in our crowded hospitals, the children without pain relief and the multiple other problems that afflict the health service. The vast overruns entertained by the Government in its management of the national children's hospital project have caused complete dysfunction in other areas of the health sector which now lack vital funding.

Incredibly, despite the spending listed in this year's budget there will be no increase in pensioners' incomes next year. There will be no increase in retirement pensions, the invalidity pension or the blind welfare allowance. I could name 28 social welfare payments which have seen no increase. There were four or five small changes to social welfare and other weekly payments. It is an astonishing failure of performance. The Government should not think that pensioners and other social welfare recipients will forget it, particularly when the Government constantly talks in stellar terms about statistics showing we are the third richest nation in the world or the European country with the most money. Despite this, we cannot increase social welfare payments by €5 a week. That is really distressing. This is the first time this has happened since 2014, when there was a very clear resumption of social welfare increases, including the restoration of the Christmas bonus which Fianna Fáil had abolished.

The Minister of State has come here with the Government accounts. We still have not received any serious explanation in accounting terms of how €24 million paid in taxes by airlines was refunded and recorded as consultancy fees. Could the Minister please explain how such a misstatement of accounting information was included in the Supplementary Estimates?

I still have not heard an explanation that satisfies me. As somebody who has worked in the accounting field, I must confess that I no longer believe the health accounts. IFAC did not disagree with me when we discussed that a week ago.

What I will say next provides a stark contrast. I was in the Phoenix Park last night with the OPW which, with Fáilte Ireland, spent €400,000 on a consultancy exercise on the park that repeated one that had been done previously and added nothing new to what we know about the Phoenix Park, its protection and significance. Up the road in Mulhuddart community centre, a group of workers are paid salaries with a contribution of funds from Pobal. Pobal will not pay them the minimum wage. We have no explanation as to why Pobal as an entity is not funded to ensure that community workers who are working hard in local communities are not paid at least the minimum wage. Could the Minister of State, Deputy O'Donovan, give me an answer to that question?

Further up the road in Huntstown and Hartstown, a sum of approximately €300,000 would enable essential fire safety repair works to be carried out. Instead, the OPW and Fáilte Ireland were able to spend €400,000 on consultancy - we do not know the reason for that - on the Phoenix Park, while up the road vital community centres and crèches may be closed because the Government cannot find a way to fund Pobal to carry out the necessary works for fire safety purposes in two community centres. That is due to the incompetence of this Government. To be perfectly honest, people cannot understand the sums, yet the Government fails to deliver.

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