Ulick Burke (Fine Gael)

The Minister's speech was the most appalling and pathetic display of incompetence and justification of a case that was ever presented to the House. The Minister was named as the person with direct responsibility for this board and for the dormant accounts. The distrust in people's minds in the House as well as outside it stems from events that took place during the lifetime of the last Government. The former Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, Food and Rural Development, Deputy Ó Cuív, declared publicly that he had no function within the Department and the Taoiseach, as a gesture of goodwill, allowed him to create the CLÁR programme, whose functions were set out on paper. The reality is that if we are to judge the potential of a slush fund based on the record of Deputy Ó Cuív as controller of CLÁR, it is no surprise there is distrust. The record speaks for itself.

There is approximately €175 million in the fund currently, but when dormant insurance policies and so on are taken into account there may be something in the region of €500 million to disburse. That is of concern to many people. The record of Deputy Ó Cuív's efforts under the CLÁR programme in County Galway shows that he has provided, for example, footpaths to the doorways of individual supporters. He has provided roads and boreens to the homes of certain supporters. This is not hearsay — it is a matter of fact. We are now going to give him far more funds. I do not know what share he will give the Minister of State but in light of his record there will be little to spend on RAPID or the drugs task forces in Dublin and throughout the country. He will not lay a hand on the money if that Minister gets his hands on it first. He will have it allocated; he probably already has most of it allocated. That is the fear and concern as a result of past experience.

I challenge the Minister, Deputy Ó Cuív, to come to the Seanad and justify what he has done with CLÁR funding. That will give a clear insight to the Minister of State, if he does not already have it, to the Government and to the public of what that man is capable of and, if he gets his hands on this massive amount of money, what he will do to his personal advantage in the internal conflict within the constituency of Galway West, a conflict he created.

More recently, we discovered the Minister has taken responsibility for a new scheme. He has taken it from FÁS and the Minister of State, Deputy Fahey. He said he will take 150 jobs into his Department and take responsibility for payment under a scheme which he has not yet described. He has not said how one can apply to it. All he said was that if anybody wished to participate in the scheme, they must have a herd number. Nobody has heard anything since budget day about the Minister's intentions. In this dormant accounts fund he sees a means of getting funding for the scheme and I am suspicious of what he is capable of doing. The public, knowing what the Minister has done over the past couple of years, is equally suspicious. That is justifiable cause for putting this motion before the House.

The motion is not put down in response to parliamentary questions in the Lower House. The motion is based on facts and on the fear of allowing the Government, in the person of the Minister, Deputy Ó Cuív, and with the Minister of State carrying the can, to use this fund as a slush fund.