Geraldine Feeney (Fianna Fail)

I congratulate the Minister for Finance, Deputy McCreevy, and the Government on the wonderful initiative we know as decentralisation. I was born and reared in what is now a gateway town and I am now fortunate enough to live in another gateway town. I know at first hand the immeasurable impact decentralisation has on a town such as Sligo. We have the pensions section of the Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs, which has provided more than 700 jobs. Nobody can know what this has meant to Sligo and its environs. It has made the town. The vibrancy in the town and county goes beyond anything we expected.

Other speakers asked why everything should be kept on the east coast. Of course Departments should be decentralised. There was a constant stream of begrudgery from the Opposition. The only problem Fine Gael and the Labour Party have is that the idea was not theirs. When those parties were in power all those years ago, they did not introduce any programme such as this. One Senator claimed that no power was being given in this programme. However, the most important way of giving power is through jobs. Relocating 100 jobs to Sligo town will mean an extra 250 people living there. I could go on all night as to what that will do for services, sporting clubs and schools in the town as it is a good news story.