Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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I move:

That Dáil Éireann commends the 2007 Estimates for Public Services (Abridged) published by the Minister for Finance on 16 November 2006.

The 2007 gross pre-budget Estimates provide for expenditure of just over €54 billion, comprising €46.7 billion current and €7.6 billion capital. This represents an increase of just over €4 billion or 8.1% on the 2006 forecast outturn. The Estimates represent the correct balance between making necessary provision for our public services and ensuring maintenance of a prudent and sustainable budgetary position. They build on the significant increase in public expenditure of recent years that has led to a real improvement in public services in many areas. On budget day I will set out additional expenditure measures in the areas of health and social welfare.

The 2007 Estimates must be viewed against the background of economic and social progress in the past decade. The economy has been transformed during the past ten years. It grew at an annual average rate of more than 7% in GDP terms between 1997 and 2005. Our debt to GDP ratio will be approximately 25.5% of GDP in 2006, the second lowest in the euro area. Ireland's unemployment rate of approximately 4.25% is one of the lowest in the European Union, where the average unemployment rate of 8% is nearly double the rate in Ireland. The level of employment this year exceeded 2 million for the first time in the history of the State.

We are spending €6,700 more on public services for every man, woman and child in the country than we did in 1997. This extra expenditure has led to real improvements in our public services. On the capital side, as a result of the increased spending, great advances have been made in the provision of new roads, radically improved public transport, new and improved schools and hospitals, more social housing and other essential infrastructure that has improved prosperity and enhanced quality of life. The following are just some examples of what has been achieved. We have made major progress on new motorways from Dublin to the south, Portlaoise, to the west, Kinnegad thus far, and the north, Belfast, which is nearly complete, resulting in significant savings in journey times. There has been major investment in roads in urban areas and non-national roads in rural areas.

Under the rail safety programme which we introduced upon returning to office, 760 km of track were relaid throughout the country by the end of 2005, the quality of rolling stock has been considerably upgraded and there has been significant enhancement of suburban rail capacity. The Luas has been built and carried more than 22 million passengers in 2005, more than 60,000 each day.

Since 1997, some 100,000 households or approximately 250,000 people have benefited from various social and affordable housing programmes. In the period 2000 to 2005, 76 new schools were built at primary and post-primary level, with construction under way at a further 23 new schools. Some 380 largescale refurbishment and extension school projects were completed, with construction of a further 54 projects under way. More than 6,000 small-scale projects involving upgrade works and minor extensions have been delivered. There have been other major improvements in areas such as water and wastewater services, child care and the provision of health facilities.

Major improvements have arisen from our increased investment in current expenditure in the past decade. The total patient throughput in hospitals has increased by more than 300,000 to over 1 million per year; waiting times for common surgical procedures have been dramatically reduced from years to two to five months; there are more than 3,000 home care packages for older people, where there was none in 1997; and there are more than 1,500 additional acute hospital beds in use.

The pupil-teacher ratio at primary level has fallen from 22:1 in 1996-97 to 17:1. At post-primary level, the reduction has been from 16:1 to 13:1 in that time. More than 7,000 extra primary teachers work solely with children with special needs. Alongside them, nearly 8,000 special needs assistants provide individual support for children with special needs compared with fewer than 300 when we entered office. At third level, there are 45,000 more places, wider representation from groups in society and increasing numbers graduating, particularly in the key areas of postgraduate and PhD studies.

These and other positive changes for the better have improved quality of life, enhanced social inclusion, improved access to opportunity and will support our economic development in the years ahead. They refute any assertion that there is little to show for the investment made by the Government.

Turning to the 2007 Estimates, for the third year in a row expenditure is forecast to be within profile, reflecting the Government's sound management of the public finances. In the 2006 Revised Estimates Volume the gross current spending provision was €43.8 billion. Latest indications are that outturn on current spend for this year will be €43.5 billion, or broadly on target.

On the capital side, when account is taken of €182 million which Departments currently indicate they will carry forward for spending in 2007, the capital cash spend will be €6.8 billion in 2006, which is an increase of 16% on the 2005 cash spend and shows the effort being made to build up the productive side of the economy. Of the planned increase of just over €4 billion for 2007, over €3 billion is for current spending on day to day services and almost €1 billion is for capital. The Exchequer capital allocation to address key infrastructural priorities for 2007 is €7.6 billion. This represents an increase of 12.7% on the forecast outturn for 2006. On a cash basis, when account is taken of forecast carryover spending into 2007, the year on year increase will be 13.6%.

The 2007 capital provision will fund a number of service improvements. The sum of almost €1.5 billion to be spent on roads will build on the substantial investment made to date by the Government and will fund the continuing upgrade of the major interurban routes to motorway or high quality dual carriageway standard. These routes are on schedule for completion by 2010. Overall eight roads projects of over 84 km in length are scheduled for completion in 2007 and six projects amounting to 212 km in length will commence.

An increase of 58% or €780 million in public transport demonstrates our commitment to investment in that area. This will fund key projects, including the further development and expansion of the Luas, the commencement of phase I of the western rail corridor and the Cork commuter services in 2007 and 160 new buses for Bus Éireann, in addition to the 100 new buses for Dublin Bus recently agreed.

The provision of €1.3 billion for housing will fund Government commitments under Towards 2016 to planned increases in social housing output targets of 27,000 social housing starts and 17,000 affordable housing starts over the period 2007 to 2009.

The huge progress made in recent years in the provision of environmental services has facilitated record levels of housing construction output and commercial development. The €427 million provided in 2007 will ensure further progress in this area and will, in particular, address the remaining schemes to ensure full compliance under the EU urban wastewater treatment directive.

The capital provision for education will be €707 million, an increase of 11%. This should enable approximately 80 new school building projects to be progressed during the year, together with about 160 large scale refurbishment or extension projects, and over 1,000 smaller scale projects.

In health, the gross capital provision of €657 million will fund a range of important capital services, primarily building and equipping of hospitals and health facilities generally.

A large increase in the capital provision for agriculture to over €275 million will support commitments under Towards 2016. A particular focus is on assisting the farming sector to restructure and modernise and to comply with environmental requirements. Key features include the provision of over €81 million for the farm waste management scheme, which will help farmers meet the requirements of the nitrates directive, and a 55% increase in installation aid rates, bringing the maximum payment rate to €15,000 to advance farm restructuring and modernisation.

On the current side the 2007 Estimate is €47 billion or a 7.4% increase on the 2006 forecast outturn. Over €2.4 billion, or 75% of the additional €3.2 billion, is being allocated to the three priority areas of health, education and social welfare.

The total current spending allocation for health next year is almost €14 billion, an increase of €1.4 billion or 11.3% on the 2006 outturn of €12.5 billion. The 2007 pre-budget provision for health will fund service improvements in key areas and will include €75 million to commission and open in 2007 eight new units in acute hospitals. A further €40 million is being provided in 2007 on top of the substantial increase in 2006 to meet a commitment to expand services for the elderly and there will be an expansion of primary care teams and of education and training for health professionals.

A further €130 million is being allocated for the office of the Minister with responsibility for children to cover four early child care payments next year, as compared with the three paid in 2006 when the scheme was introduced. An extra €120 million is also being allocated to deal with additional costs in the drugs payment scheme and €360 million is being provided for the long-stay charges repayment scheme in 2007.

The pre-budget allocation for social welfare is almost €14 billion. Social welfare is central to the Government's policies on social inclusion and makes a huge difference to the lives of many people in our society, with just under 1 million people receiving a welfare payment of one type or another each week. Under the Government, allowing for the cost of living, pensions and the lowest social welfare rates have increased by between 45% and 55% in real terms.

Almost €8 billion is being allocated for current spending on education and science in 2007 to make major provision for the education of more than 940,000 young people. This is an increase of €563 million over the 2006 forecast outturn, or 7.7%. Some €2.64 billion is provided in 2007 for current spending on primary level, €2.74 billion for post-primary schools and €1.8 billion for third level education. This will meet the cost of service improvements in a number of key areas, including 800 additional teachers in 2007 which will bring to almost 1,900 the number of new teachers provided since 2005 to reduce class size and help tackle problems of disability and disadvantage. It will provide for more than 1,400 extra special needs assistants who significantly improve the experience of education for disabled young people and a 13% increase in capitation grants for schools. It will also provide an extra €20 million for school buses, bringing the total allocation on school transport to €165 million. At third level €60 million will be provided for the strategic innovation fund, an increase of €45 million on 2006.

The total provision for the justice group for 2007 will be €2.4 billion, an increase of 9% on this year's outturn. The main element, €971 million, is in respect of Garda pay and provides funding for the increase in Garda numbers to meet the programme for Government commitment to a force of 14,000. Some €150 million of the justice provision is for capital, including provisions to further modernise the IT and communications equipment available to the Garda Síochána which is vital in the fight against crime.

The provision for day-to-day spending on agriculture is €1.4 billion and is the first year's funding of the seven-year package of rural development measures recently negotiated as part of the social partnership programme, Towards 2016. Again, the strategic focus is on modernisation and environmental requirements. Accordingly, enhancements and increases in grant rates include a 17% increase in rates for REPS, with a 2007 provision of €328 million, an 8% increase in compensatory allowances in disadvantaged area payments, with a 2007 provision of €257 million and an enhanced early retirement scheme with an increased maximum payment rate of €15,000, a 10% increase in that rate.

The commitment of €814 million for overseas development aid in 2007 meets our interim target of reaching 0.5% of GNP by 2007. This represents an increase of €139 million, or 21%, on the 2006 allocation of €675 million. Ireland's contribution rate of 0.5% compares favourably with current average figures of 0.3% in the OECD and 0.43% in the European Union.

Raising Ireland's performance level in science, technology and innovation is essential to our future competitiveness and continued prosperity. The Government is therefore allocating €755 million in capital and current expenditure for implementation in 2007 of the strategy for science, technology and innovation. This is an additional €66.4 million or an increase of 15% on 2006.

Budget 2006 announced a number of child care measures, including a new five-year national child care investment programme designed to create an extra 50,000 child care places by 2010. At least 5,000 of these places will be for school-going children before and after school hours and 10,000 will be pre-school education places aimed at three to four year olds. The 2007 child care provision is €142 million, an increase of €48 million or nearly 50% on 2006, to enable further significant progress to be made towards the achievement of these targets.

In my 2005 budget I announced a multi-annual investment programme for specific high priority disability support services designed to improve the quality of life for disabled persons, particularly in the key areas of health, education and training and access. To provide for further delivery on this commitment, the 2007 Estimates include provision for expenditure of €3.6 billion on disability-specific services compared to an estimated €3.3 billion this year. This is an increase of 10%.

The gross provision for 2007 to fund public service pay and pensions is some €18 billion, an increase of €1.2 billion or 7%. This represents 38% of the total gross current expenditure provision for 2007. The pay terms of the Towards 2016 social partnership agreement accounts for just over €740 million of this.

The 2007 pay and pensions bill of €18 billion is a significant commitment of resources. Of this amount, some €14.9 billion or 83% is in respect of the frontline services of health, education and security. The Government has permitted increases in the number of staff in these areas in recent years and I make no apology for this. These are labour intensive services and if we wish to get maximum benefit from enhanced capital expenditure in the areas of health and education we must adequately staff the resultant new or enhanced facilities and see a contribution from other parts of the service, which is happening.

Nonetheless, the taxpayer is entitled to full value for money in respect of this significant outlay. Accordingly, payment of the pay increases under Towards 2016 will be dependent, in the case of each sector, organisation and grade, on independent verification of co-operation with flexibility and ongoing change, including co-operation with satisfactory implementation of the agenda for modernisation set out in the agreement.

To date, the verification process has brought about real efficiencies and improvements in public services. The introduction of systems such as on-line motor tax systems enable people to pay their car tax on-line. The Revenue Commissioners on-line service reported processing 3.5 million returns in June this year and 7.8 million customer information requests. There are longer opening hours in health facilities in response to public demand involving earlier starts and later finishes, from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., in a range of outpatient facilities such as dedicated outpatient diabetes, physiotherapy and cancer clinics, radiography departments, weekly late night dental clinics and antenatal classes in a growing number of locations. There is also the example of revised work processes in the Department of Social and Family Affairs which have reduced, among others, the average processing time for disability benefit from some eight days in November 2003 to five days in January 2006.

More generally, I have accorded particular priority to the issue of value for money since being appointed Minister for Finance and have introduced a number of initiatives which are designed to ensure more effective and efficient allocation and management of resources by Government and Ministers, Departments and agencies; better value for money for the taxpayer and greater accountability to the Oireachtas and the public.

We now have in place a value for money framework which includes the rolling multi-annual capital envelopes for public capital investment; revised guidelines for the appraisal and management of capital expenditure; public private partnerships to procure suitable projects; reforms to public procurement including moving to more fixed price contracts; additional value for money measures on procurement, ICT projects and consultancies announced in October 2005 which include individual accountability for major projects, peer review of ICT projects and reporting of project outcomes against budgets and timeframes; new arrangements for value for money policy reviews, in place of the expenditure review initiative, under which some 90 value for money reviews with an indicative coverage of 10% to 15% of Departments' and offices' budgets will be carried out in the period 2006-2008; a central expenditure evaluation unit in my Department to promote best practice in appraisal and evaluation generally and compliance by Departments and agencies with the enhanced value for money requirements; and reform of the Estimates and budgetary process announced in budget 2006.

Under the Government's Estimates reforms, from 2007 Ministers will submit to the Dáil an annual output statement in tandem with their Estimates which will enable the relevant committees, in considering the Estimates, to get a better picture of what outputs are being achieved at programme level for the funding for which approval is being sought.

The Government's 2007 Estimates are fiscally sustainable, economically appropriate and politically responsible. Maintaining stability has been the cornerstone of our economic success. Stable sensible policies have enabled us to generate the resources necessary to tackle poverty and social inequalities and to improve public services.

On budget day I will provide for a social welfare package and some additional expenditure on health. The Government will publish the National Development Plan 2007-2013 in January which will set out our seven year investment programme and financial framework for sustainable social and economic development over the medium term. I commend the motion to the House.

Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)
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The Minister said an extra €6,700 was being spent for every man, woman and child in the country. That is true. The Government has spent an extraordinary amount of money in the last few years. In the seven years 2000 to 2007, current spending by the Government has increased by an astonishing 120%. That is €19,000 more in that period for every family in the country. Consumer prices in that period have increased by 28% so the Government has been commanding a significant extra dollop of resources.

The Government will say GNP has been growing but Government spending has been growing 50% faster than GNP. The Government is hugely expanding its tax take and spending. Indeed, current spending as a proportion of GNP has increased from 24% in 2000 to over 30% this year. The Government has been dramatically expanding its take.

With this money at its disposal, have we seen a transformation in the quality of public services? I believe the Government spends casually and leaves the taxpayer to pick up the tab. That is the reason we have not seen commensurate change. The Minister cited the extra manpower, buildings and so forth that have been generated by the €320,000 million in current spending and the €60,000 million in capital spending. We would want to see some extra buildings and manpower for that amount. However, that is not the test of value for money.

The real test of value for money is the experience of people who are dependent on and using public services. How are weak pupils doing in our schools? How are people who present with a medical emergency being treated in our hospitals? How are people who are prey to drug dealers and gangsters experiencing protection from the State? On those measures, we do not see an impact. The Comptroller and Auditor General showed that the relative position of weak pupils has not improved over a period of so-called priority for disadvantage.

In accident and emergency departments the same problems are still apparent. Even though there are no more people attending these departments than attended them ten years ago, there are still the same problems and in many cases they are more acute than they were previously. However, I take my hat off to the Minister, Deputy Harney, given that she has admitted that this is a national emergency. I hope the signs of improvement now visible will be sustained. The accident and emergency departments are still in a worse situation than they were two years ago, when she made that announcement. It was only when it became a national emergency and there was an effort to kick ass that anything changed. Similarly, the position of people who are prey to drug dealers and gangsters is continuing to worsen.

These are the tests that must be addressed. Targets must be set and Ministers must be judged against them. The real tragedy is that, once again this year, the Minister has compiled the Estimates with no programme evaluation and no targets set by Ministers by which the success of their spend will be judged. It is a spend of €60,000 million this year. No corner shop in the country would draw up its budget in that way. Anybody who tried to set a budget for the year ahead would be expected to set targets or benchmarks which would indicate success. That is not asked of Ministers and it is not good enough. It is not good enough to ask the taxpayer to stump up that type of money and not apply the rigours one would expect any minor business to apply.

There will be no meaningful debate in the House on the Estimates. Once again there will be no opportunity to evaluate the choices being made, what the targets should be for these choices or whether better choices could have been made. There will be no such debate. It is a meaningless debate occurring within two weeks of the Budget Statement, when the entire process will be wrapped up. So much for scrutiny and evaluation.

The truth is there is a tendency in the Government to seek to operate in the comfort zone of secrecy. That is the hard reality. Ministers do not wish to undergo serious evaluation but prefer to have their hour in the sun when they issue their press release and tell the world how much better it will be as a result of the 2007 Estimates. However, they do not have any suggestions to make regarding scrutiny of what happened to last year's promises. The taxpayer is expected to believe that all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds and to make an act of faith in the instinct of these Ministers. Unfortunately, their past judgments do nothing to justify such beliefs.

It is intolerable that the Estimates have been presented in the same manner for an eternity and that the same procedure will be inflicted on us next year. One only needs to conduct a casual review of the promises made by Ministers to see why. Eight new units in acute hospitals were promised, yet the acute units announced two years ago for Beaumont Hospital have not yet been delivered. Last year we were told 75 primary health centres would be built but they have not materialised. The promised additional 230,000 medical and general practice cards have not been provided. Fewer than 40% of the target number of affordable houses have been built. Six of the transport projects which were announced last year have not yet commenced, so they are being announced again this year as if the bright eyed and bushy tailed Minister for Transport suddenly thought of a great new programme. The Tánaiste and Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform claims to have already reached his target for the Garda, although the Minister for Finance at least has the honesty to admit we will not have reached it by the end of 2007. Spin is not enough when such vast sums of money are being spent.

Ministers seem to make their promises without so much as a blush of shame. How gullible does the Government think taxpayers are? We must insist that Ministers publish key performance indicators when they seek approval for their Estimates. They should not be awarded budget increases, whether of 10% or 2%, unless they commit to setting out what they plan to deliver. Such indicators have to become part of the Estimates procedures in order that they can inform a serious debate in this House on the options. We were promised in a document, which contained some interesting recommendations despite having room for improvement, that key performance indicators would be published by 2005. The Secretaries General of the Departments came together and decided to take this approach. However, the fact that the benchmarks for performance are to be delayed until after the next general election indicates the seriousness with which value for money is regarded by the Government.

The announcement in June by the Minister for Finance on the value for money initiative does not meet any acceptable standard. When the programme of expenditure review was introduced, it was intended to be a three year rolling programme within which the entirety of the Government's programmes would be subjected to critical evaluation, so that Ministers would act on the review's recommendations. The programme of review has since been ground into the dirt and, as the Secretaries General have admitted, there is no indication that the tiny number of reviews which were conducted have had any impact on programmes. That does not represent value for money but what the Minister announced in June is just more of the same. Of the promised 92 reviews, 31 are inheritances from schemes which were supposed to have been completed three or more years ago. The total value of the reviews to be undertaken in 2006 will represent less than 3% of total expenditure. At that rate, it will take 35 years to complete the programme. The extraordinary exemption given to the Department of Health and Children from any programme review means that we will not see a review from that Department until 2008, even though we have not seen one since 2001. During that period, it will have spent half of GNP, or €84 billion. Therefore, it is not surprising that people continue to sit in accident and emergency departments and wonder why, with spending trebled, the care they are receiving is no better than a decade ago. The Minister must reform this system if we are not to be continually disappointed with the progress we make. He has been citing lists of inputs without mentioning the critical test of success, outcomes.

Hidden within these estimates is a plan to substantially increase taxation. An additional €1,000 million in motor tax, social insurance and health and training levies will be raised from families and businesses in 2007. Families will struggle to find this extra money at a time when they are already tightly strapped from meeting the costs of rising interest rates, mortgage payments and energy bills. There is no evidence of sensitivity in this Government to the fact that it should cut its cloth, in terms of raising tax, to the measure of what people can afford. The Estimates also conceal increases in local authority commercial rates and planning development charges because the Minister is only making provision for a 2% increase in local government spending. I do not know how he will square that with the extra 7.4% he has allotted for the Government's general services.

The Government tries to run under the flag of a low tax administration but the massive pre-election spending spree in 2001 and 2002 entirely demolished that reputation. Of course, taxes did not start to bite until after the 2002 election. Since then the tax take, as a proportion of GNP, has increased by 4% and, for ordinary families, the tax take, as a proportion of personal income, has increased by 7% to 38.5%. Overall, the average household has had to come up with an additional €7,500 since 2002, as well as a further €3,000 in stealth taxes.

We have to move on from a sterile presentation of the Estimates which focuses solely on inputs to a serious debate about outcomes. Unfortunately, yet another year has been lost in making that change. Fine Gael and the Labour Party have published a joint programme, The Buck Stops Here, because we are determined to make the shift in the discussion from what we expect to gain from taxpayer's money in terms of spending programmes and projects to the question of outcomes. That will require tough discipline for Ministers and other officials with responsibility for programmes, as well as demanding standards in every area of expenditure.

In the area of crime we have to seriously consider the manner by which we deploy the resources of the justice system to deliver results. As Deputy Kenny noted earlier today, the budget of the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform, across the courts, the prisons and the Garda, has been more than doubled, yet crime levels have surged since 2000. All the gains made after the killing of Veronica Guerin have been lost in the intervening years. At the same time, detection rates for serious crime have decreased dramatically, from 44% ten years ago to 34% now. That means two out of every three people are getting away with serious crimes. The only measure guaranteed to predict whether crime is expanding is the chance of getting away with an offence. If we are presiding over a justice system in which the odds of criminals being able to get away with their crimes are increasing at an alarming rate, we are failing to deploy resources properly. If rigorous targeting and performance indications were being applied, there would be red faces in the justice system. We would be asking, for example, why the Prison Service does not measure the percentage of people who reoffend. It seems that the most obvious test of the success of a prison is whether those who leave it are more or less likely to reoffend. The percentage is not even measured, never mind a target for improvements.

The Minister ought to take this issue much more seriously. He should warn Departments that they will not receive budget increases if they do not implement evaluation programmes that are more serious and deep-rooted than the ones he announced in June. We will return here year after year, disappointed that the Government has not made sufficient progress in the past seven years on foot of the enormous opportunity afforded to it by its having 120% more funding available for public spending. We are not squeezing the maximum value from it by any means.

The Minister, or whoever has put together the data, has listed many inputs and outputs but one can ascertain what is missing by reading between the lines. Why do so few have free access to primary health care and why are there fewer preventive programmes? Why is it only the day care figures for hospitals, rather than the inpatient care figures, that have been subject to an increase? Why are there not better conditions for accident and emergency patients? The real tests of performance are being cutely ignored and facts that sound good are being used to fill up the Minister's speech. This is not good enough and the selective accounting in the Estimates is not doing justice to the taxpayer, who must ultimately come up with the money to fund the €6 billion in resources. We need a new Government that will take this challenge much more seriously than it has been taken by the current Administration in the past decade.

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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The estimated cost of running the State next year, €54 billion, sounds like a lot of money. If we were talking about the EuroMillions, we would say the punters were throwing money in tax paid at the Minister. As is the case in respect of EuroMillions, everyone hopes to win. Taxpayers hope for a new school for their area, decent care facilities for their older relatives and a bus or train to catch to work every day rather than having to experience a two hour nightmare in a car. As with EuroMillions, the Minister has produced some winners. The consequences of public investment, such as the Luas and Dublin Port tunnel, even if long-delayed and over budget, are welcomed with relief in that they will help to make matters better.

My former Labour Party colleague, Fergus Finlay, now chief executive of Barnardos, the children's charity and lobby group, put his case very well today when he asked why it is that, although the Minister will have 108 times more to spend than Mr. Haughey did when he was Minister for Finance in 1969, today's bonanza figures produce no great joy among the general population. People are worried that the elderly are now more at risk and have less entitlement to dignity than at any time in recent decades. People with disabilities are still waiting in queues for essential services and some 65,000 children still live in consistent poverty. Much poverty is intergenerational such that if a parent is poor, his or her child is also much more likely to be poor. One in three children from disadvantaged areas leaves school with severely limited capacity to read and write and do simple mathematics, which are cornerstones for progressing in education and obtaining a decent job.

People can no longer understand the billions of euro; they only understand the stories and denials that relate to them, their families, friends, villages and communities. Saying this is not to deny the economic progress that has been made, how much it is welcomed and the pride therein on the part of all parties in this House who contributed to it. It is just that, with so much money to spend, the report card for the Minister reads: "He could do so much better".

Consider an article attributed to the Minister in The Irish Times, published just before the publication of the Book of Estimates. I suppose he may say he did not write it because it is a bit of a mouthful even for someone as clever as himself. It states:

In parallel with a responsible, long-termist approach to budget policy, we have been making record investments. That year on year investment by Government in our social services and physical infrastructure is now having a real impact.

I am not sure if the Minister believes this. Had he looked at a little cartoon in the health supplement in the same paper, he would have seen the true picture. It alluded to longer delays and more queues and complaints and presented a very different view of conditions on the ground than the rosy scenario painted by the Minister.

Let me raise some serious questions about Leas Cross nursing home. There is no issue in respect of which people feel more uneasy and upset than that of Leas Cross and the other nursing homes in respect of which scandals have been emerging. The Minister for Finance and his predecessor, Charlie McCreevy, have clearly been determined to rely on tax-driven private sector investment in private hospitals and private nursing homes. Leas Cross raises a serious question over having a private health system driven by tax breaks for investors rather than an ethos of care. The Minister will tell me circumstances are different but I do not believe him.

Articles in today's newspapers, particularly one by Colm Keena in The Irish Times, carry some extraordinarily disturbing information about the Leas Cross nursing home and the company which ran it, Sovereign Projects Limited. The Irish Times records that for the year ended 31 January 2005, the home, on a turnover of just under €4 million, made a pre-tax profit of €619,839, or approximately 16%. This is an extraordinarily high rate of return. Not many enterprises, even in Offaly, are turning over such profits. Given that Leas Cross nursing home is probably in receipt of tax breaks under the special capital allowances scheme for nursing homes, which is very generous, it would be interesting to know how much tax, if any, it was liable for, even before it started incurring losses as a consequence of the HSE taking corrective action in respect of its activities.

It seems that as an investment Leas Cross nursing home, like many others, may have been primarily a tax-avoidance product. The home is located in the green belt and agricultural belt in north County Dublin. Nursing homes and other institutions can be built on such belts with few problems regarding rezoning. As I said to the Minister in last year's debate, such nursing homes, located in rural north County Dublin, are primarily development-based and enjoy the added benefit of extraordinarily generous tax breaks for the ten years for which they must operate.

The ten-year operational period was increased to 15 years for new developments from last February after I raised the issue with the Minister for Finance. Located as they are in remote rural areas, the nursing homes offer their elderly residents no independent access to local shops, the church, post office or local pub. Once again, our friends in Fianna Fáil seem to have the interests of property developers and builders much closer to heart than the needs of the frail elderly.

Ireland lags far behind many other countries such as Australia and even the United States in providing care for the elderly. We know the best solution for elderly people is for them to remain at home for as long as possible. Joined-up, care-driven solutions would include significant grants to insulate homes, install mobility aids and expand the home help system.

I met the carers in Blanchardstown this morning, including one who is looking after her 96 year old mother. We discussed why it was so difficult to obtain an occupational therapist's report and have simple aids installed in old persons' homes. It would not take an Einstein and we certainly have the money to do it.

Experts predict disaster for the health care system. The number of acute beds per capita is far below the EU average, with only 2.5 per 1,000 people in the greater Dublin area. The population will continue to increase for the next 15 years and the Minister is not responding. HSE capital spending has been cut by 2.6%.

The crisis in accident and emergency departments continues. HSE figures released to Deputy McManus in September show that only one new accident and emergency consultant post has been approved for the entire country since 2003.

While the Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Hanafin, made great play of increases in her budget that will allow a modest increase in the capitation grant to schools, it is hard for parents to celebrate when they know that their children remain in super-sized classes and can look forward to spending their entire school career in overcrowded accommodation. The increase in the capitation grant will not even meet the increased heating, electricity and insurance bills that many schools face.

The Minister does not seem to recognise the scale of the crisis in the school system. This year I have received figures for school sizes showing that in the nine schools in Dublin 15 for which she supplied figures there are a staggering 89 classes with more than 30 pupils out of a total of 155 classrooms surveyed. This means that 57% of pupils in those schools are in super-sized classes. The ongoing failure of the Fianna Fáil-Progressive Democrats Government to recognise and plan for the extraordinary population growth in developing areas such as Dublin West is disturbing. The Minister and departmental officials are putting heavy pressure on most schools in the area to increase to four streams, or 32 classrooms, catering for 1,000 primary pupils. This strategy means that the current and next generation of Dublin West schoolchildren will remain in the most overcrowded classrooms in the country.

Last week, at a public meeting in Littlepace in Dublin West, Dublin Bus confessed that its worst time for a bus from Dublin 15 to town on a quality bus corridor was two hours and 14 minutes because of gridlock on the M50, N2 and N3. It is hard not to appear churlish when one sees the awesome amount of taxpayer's money the Minister has at his disposal in the Estimates but which, although delivering more, does not seem to deliver better. The quality bus corridor from Blanchardstown launched seven years ago is still not complete and the average journey time has risen consistently, now coming in at 111 minutes. One of the draft output statements to which the Minister referred was from the Department of Transport. The output in question was eight quality bus corridors, but it did not state journey times on such corridors from Lucan and Blanchardstown to the city centre had worsened considerably. As an output measurement, that is especially meaningless.

The Taoiseach, when opening the National Aquatic Centre, famously spoke of Blanchardstown being a 20 minutes' journey from the GPO, to gasps from the audience. That might well be the case if one were travelling in a State car or had quality public transport. Unfortunately, we do not and the question is why people should grant the Government five more years of excuses, failure to complete and simply messing about. I concede that there has been welcome progress, but it is equally true that quality of life on many fronts has diminished, including commuting, public transport, buying a home, safety on the streets and reasonable health services.

The Ministers opposite often complain that people do not understand them. Sometimes they sound like they are on their way to a counselling session. They believe people fail to recognise that everything is really improving, but for many, parts are getting very much worse. It is not hard to see that the emperor has no clothes when one is wedged like a sardine on a train from Clonsilla. There are extra trains but twice the number of passengers. Passengers regularly faint because of overcrowding and are carried off, commuter soldiers in a battle that the Government will not win any time soon.

It is extremely disappointing that the Government has failed to address environmental issues in the Estimates. Irish society faces serious challenges in developing renewable energy sources and tackling carbon emissions. The world energy outlook of the International Energy Agency, IEA, for 2006 warns that many countries are on the road to disaster, with under-investment in renewable energy sources and increasing emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. Strong action is needed from the Government to get off this path, as Ireland currently has over 90% of its energy provided by imported supplies of fossil fuels such as oil and natural gas. Such is the lack of ambition on the part of Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats that, rather than addressing the problem, they seem happy to contemplate our paying tens of millions in European fines for failing to live up to obligations under the Kyoto Protocol.

The allocation in the Estimates for overseas development aid is welcome. However, the increase of 16% in bilateral aid, Ireland's direct programme with some of the poorest counties in the world, is dwarfed by contributions to UN and international bodies which, according to the Book of Estimates, are to rise by between 21% and 37%. A development programme should not simply be a case of blank cheque increases to fora such as the unreformed United Nations and other international development bodies. Ireland provides a positive example on the ground in the developing world, co-operating with local partners to complete water projects and carry out valuable health and education work. I do not know what has happened to our reputation for imagination and brilliance in Third World development that we should now simply put a cheque in the post to the United Nations. That is wrong and does not accord with our country's traditions.

Perhaps decentralisation has something to do with it. We have not heard much on the subject in this programme. I understand the latest bright suggestion from Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats is that technical specialists stay in Dublin, while other development aid staff move to Limerick. That would result in development aid being broken down into several sections. What would this do for the coherence and delivery of the programme? Decentralisation, as implemented by the Government, has been an expensive folly. Ireland and Dublin could do with proper, planned regional decentralisation, but not what we have seen from the Government.

There has been serious mismanagement of public spending projects in recent years, from PPARS to electronic voting, and an extraordinary lack of progress on projects such as integrated ticketing, which is now three times over budget but has delivered nothing. The original cost was to be €19 million, but that figure has now risen to €42 million and the meter is still ticking without anything having been achieved. There is nothing in the Estimates to show any evidence of joined-up government in providing services and securing value for taxpayer's money.

In short, public services are not being delivered as they should, given the levels of taxation people are contributing. They are willing to pay fair taxes at low rates for quality public services, a view probably shared in the Minister's party. However, members of the Carers' Association to whom I spoke this morning have not seen any delivery to those for whom they care. I know that the Government is trying to do more, but my honest view of the HSE is this. I had hoped it would work, but with €14 billion going on health services, we should be celebrating a milestone in the provision of quality care for those who need it. However, I will not be celebrating any time soon. I am simply awe-struck. The Minister is a clever man and he, too, must be awe-struck at signing off on a provision of €14 billion for the health service when a visit to any of his local health service institutions would surely have him observe with incredulity the standard of service delivery in 2006. Perhaps after ten years in government he is obliged to defend every aspect of public service delivery. He should be allowed off the leash to discuss in earnest the reality of life for so many families throughout the State.

To return to the EuroMillions analogy, it seems the only people who win the jackpot under the Government are those who invest in tax driven schemes, whether to develop private hospitals or other initiatives. There is no doubt such persons are enjoying the jackpot. What about the young couple who must pay stamp duty on the purchase of a modest second-hand home which costs €340,000? Such persons are struggling rather than enjoying any jackpot.

I spoke to a woman today who was in tears because her application for an affordable house had been rejected because her income slightly exceeded the limit for the scheme. She could not see a way for herself and her teenage daughter to get a home of their own. She is aware that she pays more in rent than she would pay in mortgage payments if she were successful in her application under the affordable housing scheme. We will discuss this issue later when we debate the Labour Party's Private Members' motion on housing.

I am aware that a worrying amount of Government expenditure is simply absorbed by public pay rises. Given the scale of funding at the Minister's disposal, however, amounting to some €54 billion, it is clear we could all be jackpot winners if only we had a Government that could manage the expenditure of resources to address the needs being expressed by people in every county, from north to south and east to west.

Dan Boyle (Cork South Central, Green Party)
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I propose to share time with Deputies Ó Caoláin and Catherine Murphy.

Séamus Pattison (Carlow-Kilkenny, Labour)
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Is that agreed? Agreed.

Dan Boyle (Cork South Central, Green Party)
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The motion asks the House to commend the Minister for Finance for presenting the Book of Estimates. This is a parliamentary device and the Government has taken a minimalist approach in having such a debate. I am certain the Minister does not require his ego to be stroked and that he is confident in his own abilities. I am also certain, however, that many of those who speak on the Government benches will do precisely that in the course of this debate.

Our job, as Opposition spokespersons, is not to stroke the Minister's ego. We have significant concerns, not only about what is proposed to be spent next year but also the manner in which that expenditure will be managed. I am disappointed that, despite promises in this regard, little has changed in the presentation of the Estimates figures. We are, once again, presented with a set of global figures for Government spending, both current and capital, for each Department. There is little concrete information that would help us as legislators to analyse whether public money is being spent effectively.

It would be helpful if the Estimates figures were to show the largest spending items in each Department and how these compared with expenditure figures in previous years. The generic headings in the Book of Estimates, as in every previous year, do little to inform us as legislators or the public. We only learn of the detail of the Estimates through subsequent pronouncements by the Minister for Finance and other Ministers. This does not help the process and I hope the Minister's commitment towards reform in this area will become more evident in the short time remaining to the Government before the next general election.

The job of an Opposition spokesperson in this area is a difficult one. It would be churlish to rail against the expenditure of almost €55 billion. The reality, however, is that important questions remain to be asked as to whether the allocations under each heading for each Department are precisely the wisest choices, particularly in the light of our experiences of the Government since 1997 and how public money has been wantonly spent in several key public expenditure areas.

The Minister has tried to make virtue out of necessity in several areas. He is undoubtedly aware of the well known observation regarding lies, damned lies and statistics. His speech was loaded with statistics that are creatively explained. His lauding of the rail safety programme as one of the Government's major areas of expenditure since 1997 refers to what was very much an expenditure of necessity. It was precisely because of the neglect of successive Governments, in most of which the Minister's party was involved, that the decline of the rail network advanced to such a sorry state. Despite huge expenditure of €750 million, we have not seen one inch of additional rail track.

It is for this reason that I look askance at new public expenditure proposals. As a Cork representative, there is an expectation that by 2008 we may see the first reopening of a rail line since the closure of railway lines in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s. We have yet to see, however, whether the Government has the imagination to put in place a public transport infrastructure that reflects the way in which the country has been allowed to develop in all the wrong ways in many cases, as my colleague and party leader, Deputy Sargent, observed during Leaders' Questions.

The question of whether public expenditure is being managed effectively in the area of public transport, in particular, was brought home to me last week in the aftermath of my initial response to the Book of Estimates. I travelled to Heuston Station to take a 7 p.m. train home to my constituency. That train did not depart, however, and two new trains that were to follow were cancelled by Irish Rail. I arrived home at 1 a.m. Given the many millions of euro that have been pumped, in a haphazard and unplanned way, into buying new rail stock and improving the rail network, what does the reality of rail travel for many passengers say about public expenditure in infrastructural projects in general?

These are the questions that the Minister and the Government have not asked themselves. A major act of mass hand-washing is taking place in regard not only to providing and spending resources but also in making sure the resources provided are managed in a way that offers value for money. This is something that is apparent across a broad range of public expenditure areas.

Another instance of the curious use of statistics in the Minister's speech is his reference to the waiting times for common surgical procedures being reduced from five months to two. We first need a definition of "common" and how such procedures differ from others. The Minister must be aware, as is every other Member of the House, that the position on waiting lists has changed from those who require services from our hospitals to those waiting simply to see a consultant who will make the decision on whether a medical procedure is required. If the €14 billion to be spent in the health service is being used merely to transform one waiting list into another type, what measure of success can the Government claim? The Minister for Finance and his colleague, the Minister for Health and Children, must answer more forthrightly for their stewardship of the health service.

The issue that is ignored in the Estimates is climate change and the effects it may have on future economic development if it is not tackled effectively. The Minister merely paid lip service to this issue in his last budget with several initiatives such as the promise to establish a carbon fund, enabling legislation for which has not yet been introduced in the House more than a year later. At least we now have the benefit of the British Government's Stern report to show us there is an intrinsic link between environmental degradation and possible dangers to economic development because of the failure to act on environmental responsibilities. If the Minister wants his stewardship of the economy to be seen in a stronger light, it is not only fiscal budgeting for which he has responsibility but also resource budgeting. If the latter is not acted upon, whatever is put in place will be undermined by the failure to take proper decisions.

Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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The Estimates represent more of the same from a tired Government, bankrupt of ideas and too long in power. It is spending moneys but has no strategy for equality and delivering public services in a more equitable and efficient way. The Estimates and budget will be the last before the general election. The Fianna Fáil-Progressive Democrats Government will be ten years in office next year. It needs to be judged, not on the Estimates nor on the forthcoming budget but on its record in the past decade.

After ten years the health system is still mired in crisis; housing is unaffordable for tens of thousands of families; and inequality and poverty are still with us, despite the Celtic tiger. The key question is whether revenue is being properly directed at addressing deficiencies in public services and at helping those who have benefited least from the economic boom of recent years.

Headline figures do not tell the full story. The question for many Departments is not how much money they spend, but the extent to which money is wasted, subsidising the private sector through public private partnerships and an unjust two-tier health system. Sinn Féin has called for the Comptroller and Auditor General to examine all existing PPP projects for cost overruns, revenue forgone and wastage against long-term cost and profit projections. We reiterate this call, as we face the huge cost of buying out the PPP contract for the West Link toll bridge.

For Sinn Féin, during this time of affluence, the priority must be using the additional revenue available to the Government to address the plight of those who have been left behind, those on housing waiting lists, those most vulnerable to heat and electricity price rises and those surviving on social welfare payments, inadequate to keep them out of poverty. We will have to wait until budget day to see if the Minister will make any significant commitments to them.

The 10% increase for local authority and social housing programmes is not significant when one considers house price inflation has been running at approximately 15%. It will not advance in any meaningful way towards the elimination of social housing waiting lists. The additional revenue which has flowed into the State's coffers as a result of the construction boom has not been used to eliminate social housing waiting lists. This revenue stream is unsustainable in the long run. A portion of it must be ring-fenced for addressing the needs of those who have borne the brunt of the escalation of house prices and the underbuild in the social housing sector.

The State continues to pay out many millions annually in rent allowance, most of which goes straight into the pockets of private landlords. This week a constituent of mine seeking rent allowance was informed she would only receive it if she could access accommodation with a rent of €80 per week or less. What kind of accommodation can be accessed for that rent in the Ireland of 2006? This is the plight to which those on low incomes and in need of housing are condemned by the Government's lack of a real housing policy. Instead of providing social and affordable housing, it prefers to subsidise the property speculators, the developers and the private landlords.

There is no indication in the Estimates that the Minister for Finance is prioritising help for those under pressure as a result of energy price increases, nor is he prioritising the promotion of energy efficiency. While the increase for the energy research and development programme is to be welcomed, a focus on helping those faced with huge ESB and gas price hikes is needed. The Estimates should have provided for significant increases in funding for improving energy efficiency in homes and the provision of grant aid for low income households to install renewable heating systems.

While the health budget has again risen, it still continues to be ploughed into an inefficient and inequitable system with two-tier delivery of health care. The best use of facilities in public hospitals is not made because they are shared with the private sector. Many consultants continue to be paid by the State while working in the public and private health care sectors, as the long delayed negotiations with hospital consultants on a new contract continue. There is every indication their privileged position will be maintained.

The two-tier health system with two waiting lists and levels of care will be reinforced by the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Harney, with her private hospital co-location scheme. In reply to a parliamentary question from me last week she confirmed that she intended that contracts for the ten private hospitals on public hospital sites would be signed by the first quarter of 2007. No cost benefit analysis has been carried out on the scheme which has met with widespread opposition. There is no mandate for it. It was not included in the election manifestos of the Progressive Democrats and Fianna Fáil. It was not included in the Government's health strategy or the programme for Government, yet it is being forced through without reference to the Oireachtas in the dying months of the Administration and in the run-up to a general election. This fundamentally flawed scheme must be stopped.

No strategy is in place or special funding allocated for the provision of the additional 3,000 acute hospital beds needed. The HSE claims that number is not needed, while the Minister continues to pay lip-service to the Government's commitment to deliver them. This commitment has been dumped, together with much of the Government's 2001 health strategy, including the primary care strategy with its promised widespread network of primary care centres.

There are many other issues I could raise. Nearly a decade after coming to power the Government has reinforced inequality in society. It deserves to be rejected by the people for that reason alone.

Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Independent)
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This debate is not about how much is spent in the Estimates but how it is spent. Like the Minister and other Members, I received many pre-budget submissions from such organisations as the Carers Association, the Disability Federation of Ireland and the National Childrens Nurseries Association. All the submissions contained good proposals but we will have to wait for the budget to see how many of these suggestions have been taken on board. Many of the organisations concerned are run on a voluntary basis, meaning it is important that every cent is spent wisely and in a equitable manner.

There are areas where moneys can be spent wisely but savings made at the same time. I recently asked the Minister for Education and Science how much was spent on court cases to challenge parents seeking special educational needs places for their children. I was informed a sum of €20 million was spent and that only a fraction of this amount was dedicated to settlements. Almost all of the cases were settled when services were provided. I believe the figure included in the Estimates for this area is €30 million. If it were targeted correctly and to provide special educational needs places, savings would be made on courts cases which should not be taken in a country that is so well-off. Not only is it good economics, it is also good social policy.

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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This year's allocation for special educational needs measures is €820 million.

Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Independent)
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I was referring to the particular matter of court cases. I will not dispute the Minister's figures but she could spend the money wisely.

I have heard much in recent days about the raising of motor tax, the money going to local authorities and concerns in the business community about the increase in commercial rates. The motor tax fund is ringfenced for local government but several local authorities are net contributors to it, the largest being in my area, County Kildare, 35% of whose motor tax receipts go somewhere else.

There was a discussion earlier today about building communities. It is almost impossible to do this in rapidly developing areas if they are starved of cash. There is an inequitable arrangement for the allocation of the local government fund and the areas most affected are the ones that contribute most by way of stamp duty, VAT and PAYE. These are the people from the commuter belt sitting in the traffic jams every day.

The question is not what is spent but how it is spent. This has been an ongoing problem for many years and the system is starting to show serious cracks; for example, there is a major deficit in County Meath, where the council has employed consultants and may have to increase commercial rates by 300% to absorb the debt, in a county where there is rapid development and which is a major net contributor to the motor tax fund.

On public transport, we are going backwards. The number of buses promised is now 100, from 200, and there will be a lower subvention in the Estimates because the extra 100 have not been delivered. Although there has been serious investment in the train already mentioned, it is called the Calcutta Express. I invite the Minister to travel on it any morning at peak time. It is almost necessary to have a person in white gloves outside to push the passengers on board. People want to use public transport but the level of delivery falls far behind the level of need.

I listen to AA Roadwatch to measure how difficult it will be for me to travel here and every time I hear it the West Link toll bridge is mentioned. This is a crisis. Something must be done about it and could be done in the short term by raising the barriers and covering the cost of doing so. We do not have to wait until 2008.

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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Tá an-áthas orm a rá that 2007 will be another record year for increased investment in education. With an increase of 10% on last year's Estimates, a net provision of nearly €8.4 billion is being provided to support improvements right across the sector.

Comparable figures in the 1997 Estimates show that €2.8 billion was provided for education. In 2002 the figure was €5.1 billion. The sum of €8.4 billion being provided for 2007 means that the level of investment in education has trebled since 1997. It has risen by 65% since 2002.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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The Minister might as well go back another ten years.

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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A total of 11,000 more teachers have been hired since 1997; unprecedented levels of extra support have been provided for children with special needs and those from disadvantaged areas, while €3 billion has been provided for school building projects, with 1,300 under way this year.

Improvements have been made in the curriculum at levels underpinned by substantial investment in teacher training. With an additional 45,000 students at third level, bringing the total number to 168,000, third level participation rates have increased dramatically.

The scale of the increased investment in education in recent years is a testament to how central education is to the Government's social and economic agenda. The education Estimate allows for an extra €742 million in 2007.

My priorities have been and continue to be investing in special needs education and children from disadvantaged areas. Investment in special education has increased significantly in recent years. There are now 15,000 adults in schools working solely with children with special needs, compared with a fraction of this number a few years ago. We have much more work to do to bring the services to optimum level. Significant improvements are planned for the coming year. Over €820 million is being provided for special education in 2007, €180 million, or nearly 30%, more than the sum announced this time last year. This will cover, among other matters, the full year cost of the thousands of extra special education staff put in place this year. For example, of the 8,200 special needs assistants now in our schools, nearly 1,500 have been hired since September 2005. Increased investment in special education will also allow me to increase the rates of capitation paid to special schools. They range from a 30% increase in some payments to a near doubling of the rate for children with physical disabilities. These increases are a tangible demonstration of my commitment to supporting an important role for special schools.

The extra payments for children in special classes in mainstream schools will also increase at a total cost of €1.5 million. I recently received a plan from the National Council for Special Education for implementing the rest of the Education for Persons with Special Educational Needs Act.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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Will the Minister give us a copy of her script?

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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I am not obliged to give one.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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Is that because of cutbacks?

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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I am also conscious of the demands for extra support at second level as children move from primary school. These will be major priorities for me in the year ahead.

The significant increase in the provision for special education in the Estimates speaks volumes for the Government's commitment to focusing extra investment on those who need it most. Our commitment in tackling educational disadvantage is just as strong. Since I launched the Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools, DEIS, action plan last year extra teachers have been provided to reduce class sizes in the most disadvantaged primary schools; more children have been given access to special intensive programmes to help with literacy problems at an early stage; the school meals programme has been extended; and extra counselling hours have been allocated to second level schools. Recognising the important influence that parents have on their children's education, a few weeks ago I announced an expansion in the number of home-school-community liaison teachers.

Next year overall expenditure on measures to tackle disadvantage at all levels will amount to approximately €730 million, an increase of €95 million or 15% on the 2006 figure announced on Estimates day last year. As well as providing for the full-year cost of initiatives such as the 22% increase in the top-up grant for third level students already announced, this increased investment will also allow further roll-out of the DEIS plan. This will see increased funding for early literacy measures, the development of a new family literacy initiative and more money for school book loan schemes. There will also be an expansion of the school completion programme. In prioritising extra supports for children with special needs and disadvantaged areas the Government is maximising the potential of our education system to help build a fairer society.

Extra support is also essential to enable children whose first language is not English to make the most of their time at school. There are more than 1,100 language support teachers in our schools, at a cost of €67 million. While this represents more than a fourfold increase in recent years, we are committed to going even further. The Estimates provide for another 200 language support teachers. Extra teachers will be assigned to schools with the largest concentration of children with English language needs. A comprehensive strategy is being finalised which will ensure the extra investment is used to best effect and underpinned by the right support and training for teachers.

Taken together, the extra teachers provided in recent years to work with children with special needs, those from disadvantaged areas and those who need help with their English have led to a major expansion in teacher numbers. The number of primary school teachers has increased by 4,000 since 2002, with approximately 1,200 of these posts having been created in the last school year.

I am extremely proud of the progress that the Government has made in increasing teacher numbers. We have reduced the average primary class size to 24. With the unprecedented increases in support staff, there is now one teacher for every 17 primary schoolchildren, down from one for 22. Children who need extra help are getting more support than ever before. We are determined to go even further. The 2007 Estimates include provision for another 800 primary teachers, including the extra language support teachers, approximately 500 of whom will be classroom teachers, to meet our commitment to reduce class sizes. The recent improvements in school staffing are unparalleled. This area will continue to be a priority for us.

I am conscious of the need to ensure a positive atmosphere in all of our second level schools and to have effective procedures in place to deal with negative student behaviour where it occurs. The national behaviour support service has been set up to provide strong targeted support for schools that need its assistance most. I have secured €8 million in total for 2007 which will enable an expansion of both in-school and out-of-school supports. This is in addition to the extra investment in recent years in areas such as guidance counselling, home-school-community liaison and measures to tackle disadvantage that also aim to have a positive effect on student behaviour.

At both primary and second level I am pleased to be able to again provide for increases in capitation funding way beyond the rate of inflation. At primary level the basic rate of capitation will increase by €18 per pupil next year, that is, 50% higher than the increase given last year. This means every primary school will receive €163.58 per pupil from next January to cover expenses such as heating, lighting and insurance. The ancillary services grant will also increase by €6.50 to €145.50 per pupil, giving primary schools more money to cover the cost of secretaries and caretakers. Taken together, these increases mean that primary schools eligible for the full ancillary services grant will receive €24.50 extra per pupil to cover their day-to-day running costs next year, with a primary school of 300 pupils receividng approximately €7,400 extra next year. In fact, this 300 pupil school will receive €93,000 from my Department next year to meet such costs.

At second level the rate of capitation will also increase by €18 to €316 per student, while the support services grant will increase by €5 to €112. In addition, an extra €25 per student will be given to voluntary schools to continue the process towards equalisation of funding measures for that sector. This compares with a €10 increase in the equalisation grant last year. With these increases, a typical 500 student voluntary school will receive €293,000 from my Department in 2007 to meet its day-to-day costs, outside of teacher pay which is also covered by my Department. The substantial increases in capitation and services grants to schools provided for in the Estimates are a clear indication of the Government's commitment to improve our schools' finances.

Other areas that will see significant increases next year include teacher pay and pensions, professional development, schools' ICT and youth work services. Funding for the National Educational Welfare Board will also increase by20%, while provision for the National Educational Psychological Service will increase by 17% in 2007. These increases will allow for some increased staffing in both areas.

In providing increased support for children in primary and second level schools we are equally determined to substantially improve the opportunities available to those who need a second chance at education. Therefore, I am delighted that many of the extra resources promised in this area under Towards 2016 are being front-loaded and will be put in place next year. My colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy de Valera, announced last week a 12% increase in the allocation for the further and adult education sector which has increased by 50% since 2002, as well as a 14% increase in the allocation for the youth sector which has increased by 123% since 2002. This will provide 38,000 places in adult literacy services and an extra 1,000 places in the case of the back to education initiative, BTEI, in addition to assisting with child care, as well as 400 extra places on Youthreach programmes.

The funding being provided for universities and institutes of technology in 2007 will allow us to maintain and accelerate this momentum of progress. An extra €147 million for day-to-day spending — an 11% increase over the figure for 2006 — will be provided for our universities and institutes of technology. This includes an increase of €84 million to meet pay increases and other running costs; an extra €6 million to provide for continuing reform and the further expansion of places in medical education, including the commencement of graduate entry programmes, and an extra €45 million under the strategic innovation fund, SIF, bringing the fund to a total of €60 million next year. The fund is aimed at driving transformation of the higher education sector by promoting collaboration, development and change. As implementation of the first round of projects gets under way, we are already focusing on the criteria for the second round of SIF funding.

Next year will also see further major research and development funding increases as we set about implementing the Government's ambitious strategy for science, technology and innovation. An additional €12 million in current funding is being provided for the research programmes under the Education Vote, an increase of 15% over the figure for 2006. This will bring current research funding to €93 million next year. This major commitment to the enhancement of our fourth level research capacity will gather further impetus in 2007 with the allocation of awards under the fourth cycle of the PRTLI and through the implementation of co-ordinated action measures across the higher education system, public research agencies and the enterprise sector in implementing Government strategy. The over-arching objective is for Ireland to become renowned worldwide for the excellence of its research and to secure its position as one of the world's most advanced knowledge societies.

There are many areas which I could cover but these are the main ones I wish to highlight. To conclude, the 10% increase in expenditure in 2007 will allow me, among other matters, to increase expenditure on special education by nearly 30% to over €820 million; to spend €95 million more on supports for young people from disadvantaged areas; to hire 800 extra primary teachers; to promote positive student behaviour at second level; to significantly increase funding to schools; and to increase investment in third level institutions and further boost their research capacity. As has been proven, the Government is committed to education. We believe in education and the power of teachers working with parents and communities to ensure every young person receives an opportunity to reach his or her full potential.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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This will be my last opportunity ever to address the House on the Estimates and I wish to use my time wisely. I am somewhat disturbed at what we heard from the Minister for Education and Science. She began by telling us what a great person she was. She appears to believe the country only began in 1997. Everything about which we hear from members of the Government dates back to 1997, based on which we constantly hear of comparisons. How quickly we forget. If one goes back a further ten years, a Minister from the same party as the Minister for Education and Science was the only Minister in the history of the State to disimprove the pupil-teacher ratio but she has forgotten all about it.

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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Ten years ago the Minister for Education was a member of the Labour Party.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I did not interrupt the Minister. She should just sit and listen.

Séamus Pattison (Carlow-Kilkenny, Labour)
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Order, please.

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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Ten years ago the Minister for Education was a member of the Labour Party. She was Niamh Breathnach.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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She was not Minister at the time.

Séamus Pattison (Carlow-Kilkenny, Labour)
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Deputy McGrath should be allowed to speak without interruption.

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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Niamh Breathnach was Minister for Education until 1997.

Séamus Pattison (Carlow-Kilkenny, Labour)
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Order, please.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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Will the Leas-Cheann Comhairle please ask the Minister not only to desist from misleading the House which she has done on two occasions this evening but also to learn her history better? I was a Member of the House at the time and know what happened.

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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Who was Minister for Education from 1992 to 1997? It was Niamh Breathnach.

Séamus Pattison (Carlow-Kilkenny, Labour)
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Order, please.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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When the pupil-teacher ratio was disimproved in 1987, the Minister for Education was a member of the Fianna Fáil Party.

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The Deputy said ten years ago.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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That was the only time that ever occurred.

The second matter about which I am disturbed is that when I asked whether a script was available from the Minister, her response was that she was not obliged to make a copy available. This strikes me as being a new approach also. In my time in the House I have not seen such an approach. I am disappointed the Minister would make such a comment. Have we moved to such an extent that we do not bother about such matters?

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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Only the opening statement is distributed.

Séamus Pattison (Carlow-Kilkenny, Labour)
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Order, please.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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It is not out of character but in keeping with the response I have received to parliamentary questions I tabled to her today. One was related to the use of and expenditure on prefabs. I will outline the response. A further question was related to the typical cost of leasing a prefab classroom for a primary school for one year. The Minister stated in reply that she did not know. This really means she does not want to put the information on the record of the House. I will do so. The cost of leasing a prefab for a primary school is approximately €60,000 per annum. Such money is wasted by the Department. The Minister is wasting a colossal sum of money in renting prefabs.

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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We do not lease them anymore.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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Why did the Minister not answer the parliamentary question I tabled?

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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Because we do not lease prefabs anymore.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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The Minister has spent €19 million in renting temporary school premises, including prefab classrooms to date in 2006. That represents an increase of almost €4 million on the figure for the previous year and an increase of €4 million on the figure for preceding year.

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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That is because there are 11,000 more teachers.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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The Minister had her opportunity to speak. Is she so disappointed that she made such a mess of it and gave such a distorted view of where she stands that she has to keep interrupting? That is a pity.

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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I am just trying to be accurate.

Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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As I stated before I was rather rudely interrupted, the Minister's attitude is disappointing. She will not answer questions such as the one I tabled on prefab classrooms. There is a significant demand for an increase in the number of classrooms, especially in the area surrounding the Pale — the overflow from Dublin. Many schools need additional classrooms. The Department is prepared to sanction the provision of additional prefabs at the drop of a hat but will not sanction the provision of proper well built classrooms. We continue to propagate prefab villages around schools, especially in the areas to which I referred such as Kinnegad, Rathwire, Delvin, etc.