Joe O'Toole (Independent)

I welcome the Minister of State to the House. I was one of the people who asked for this debate and I believe it is important that people give of their own experiences in the discussion.

One of the problems in recent times is that commentators have been almost universally wrong. We should not listen to economists. Every economist who speaks should be literally gagged. Most of the main names are, in fact, third level teachers. The others work for financial institutions who require them to present an image which makes it easier to sell their product. These things should be said. We hear very little in the media from a small number of independent economists, because they are not the ones who are colourful. The colourful ones, who work in third level institutions, are the ones we hear regularly.

A classic example of this in the past three or four months is that these people were completely and utterly incorrect in their assessment of how the books would stand at the end of this year. The loudest of them, not a university teacher, was just €1 billion out. How can these people be €1 billion wrong and then have the brass neck to come on radio and television with no sense of what they said last month? In regard to January and February of this year, their prognosis on inflation has been almost universally wrong, with the exception of Robbie Kelleher who was quoted as taking an opposite view. All the others mentioned high inflation for these two months. They predicted it would be approximately 6%, even though we have seen it decrease from 5.1% to 4.8%. I do not know who is right or wrong in all of this. I suspect it is a bit like the recent debate with the Minister for Agriculture and Food, because people do their best in one way or another.

I want to point out some issues of Government policy with which I fundamentally disagree, but I also think that speakers should talk about their own experiences. I would like to hear my colleague, Senator Quinn, who takes a snapshot every day of what consumers are doing with their money. He could give a much cleaner interpretation of the way the economy is going than many people who are looking into books and ledgers. It is people on the ground who can give that viewpoint.