Joe O'Toole (Independent)

I will sit down and the Minister can stand up and tell us how he made the calculations. If he made it any other way, then we do not know what he is doing. There is no other calculation to be made. It is either more or less than that amount. The number of births is multiplied by the number of parents by the number of weeks by the cost per week. There is no other way to make the calculation. These are the things to be taken into consideration. The Minister claims that it works out at €200 million and I will not argue with that figure. However, the arrangement in Italy is that people get 50% of pay, which would drop the figure down to €100 million. If people were to get a quarter of pay, the figure would drop to €50 million. The problem with IBEC is that its members are too tight to pay out of their own pockets. People on parental leave, having paid for hospital and medical fees and so on, could benefit from this. Senator Henry listed a number of benefits that were available. Why is this less important? Can we not afford to put €50 million to €100 million of next year's budget into this? Is there anything better than having a parent available to a child during the period when they are bonding?

If the Minister does not put enough into parental leave, but does put something into it, then I will stand up and defend him. I will defend him before the people on my side of the House who will not be happy with it. Is that not a fair deal for the Minister? It is time to step up to the mark on this one and put a few shillings into it. We have the money. One of the differences between Ireland and the rest of Europe has been the development of social partnership. The trade union movement that is asking the Minister to ensure that parents on parental leave get a payment for it is the same movement which has taken hard decisions to ensure the modernisation of Irish work practices. Over the past 15 years, there is no other workforce in Europe that comes close to the increase in productivity of Irish workers. There has only been one year when we did not have the greatest productivity increase per worker of any country in Europe. That is something that cannot be done in France, Germany or in Italy. We can do that. We have created the wealth and now we should share it out. We should give it to the young people who have just been born and who will pay our pensions in 50 years time, although it will not be my problem at that stage.