Mark Ward (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Government needs to simply stop wasting public money. It is as simple as that. What hurts people the most is that they know that money could be spent on things that would really benefit them. For example, the €9 million spent on mobile phone pouches, which were spun as being a mental health support, could have been spent in schools on face-to-face mental health supports that children really need. There is a lack of those supports in the country at the moment.

We have seen other examples, such as the never-ending amount of money being spent on the children’s hospital. How can a project go €1 billion over budget? There will have to be a tribunal on this in future. There was €336,000 spent on a bike shed and €1.4 million on a security hut. The list goes on and on. What we have seen from successive Governments is the mismanagement of public money. This money belongs to our communities and our people and could be invested in our local areas.

In my own area there are local services on their knees. I was at a meeting last night with a local horse project that is on its knees trying to keep its operation going. This money could be spent on something like that. My community knows the value of a euro and it is an insult that the Government does not. Who is being held to account? I have not seen anyone being held to account.

I will raise an issue that has not received much attention. Does the Minister of State know how much the HSE gets fined for not paying its bills on time? Every time the HSE does not pay a bill on time - it could be for cleaning products or toilet rolls or something as simple that - it is fined. In the past two years the HSE has been fined €4.3 million for not paying its bills on time. We have seen embargoes in the health service, the lack of recruitment and the lack of investment, and this is €4.3 million that was not spent on anything.

Before the Minister of State came into the Chamber, the Minister, Deputy Chambers, spoke about value for money and accountability. Who is accountable for this? Who is responsible for this dereliction of duty? Who is responsible for this waste of public money? It stops with the Government. It stops with the Minister of State. The Government has created a culture of wasting public money. Fianna Fail, Fine Gael and the Independents in government are now responsible for this. With each scandal the public’s confidence goes down. The public is losing respect for public representatives. Sinn Féin will restore this respect and confidence. Deputy Farrell outlined a number of measures we will bring in to have accountability and transparency when it comes to spending public money. We need those measures to be implemented as soon as possible.

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