Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

It is interesting listening to the Government backbenchers. One would never think that they were aware of the court case.

The Government refused to take this money. I have to be honest and say that I support it because we have 5,000 jobs in Clonmel as a result foreign direct investment. I still support it but we cannot have schemes that are favourable to one big company. We must think of the SMEs. I want to see this money going to the SMEs to give them badly needed supports and lifelines to survive because they are being crucified by taxes, penalties, health and safety - you name it. The plethora of issues is ridiculous. They are the backbone of our economy with 98% of our businesses being SMEs and they must be supported.

There are two wonderful special schools in Cashel - Scoil Chormaic and Scoil Aonghusa - but we need a third one in Clonmel. We have the wonderful example of footprint of the two schools in Cashel and we must look after our weakest and sickest children. I met a little boy named Ross yesterday with his mother. He is five years of age with a diagnosis of autism and he cannot get a school place. This is appalling. These people must be looked after. We could fire it into the black hole of health and many other areas of the economy where we are not getting proper value for money but we need this to be spent prudently and we need to support the enablers. The enablers are the people who have small businesses and who run these small special schools in the community. This is where the money should go if we can spend it.

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