The first phase of benchmarking has cost taxpayers €600 million. This has had to be found somewhere and has been achieved by way of cutbacks. The surgical knife was used. These cutbacks have led to a queue of ambulances outside hospitals as they wait to retrieve their stretchers because there are not enough trolleys inside the hospitals to accommodate patients in the corridors or in the accident and emergency ward. These cutbacks have led to ward closures, to primary school children continuing to be condemned to sit daily in sub-standard, Dickensian hovels of primary schools, and a shortfall in revenue for the vocational education opportunities scheme which means that women hoping to re-enter the workforce cannot avail of the scheme because the child care allowance cannot be paid. I could continue to list areas that badly need services but where, unfortunately, cutbacks are the order of the day because €1.2 billion must be found to pay the benchmarking deal.