Seanad debates
Wednesday, 26 March 2003
Finance Bill 2003 [ Certified Money Bill ] : Committee and Remaining Stages.
We have low debt but very poor infrastructure. If we learned anything in 1999, 2000 and 2001, it is that investing money in infrastructure is not necessarily the best action. Doing so stokes up inflation. I will give an example to prove this point. A few years ago, the CIF advised us not to put all the projects on stream at the same time because we did not have the capacity. We were cautioned to hold back, but a year ago the CIF was telling us to release them. It is a basic economic principle that too much money taking too few goods means a rise in price. The construction industry and civil engineering firms quoted any price they liked because there was a small pool to do all the work. We were getting less value for money in those areas.
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