John Paul Phelan (Fine Gael)

I agree with the last point made by Senator Mooney. The attack on the home of Councillor Mary White was appalling. For any public representative to be subject to such an attack is unacceptable, and I agree with the comments of previous speakers in that regard.

I join with other Senators in calling for a debate on competitiveness, which should be broadened out to the entire country. Previous speakers mentioned different regions in the west but as far as I am concerned there are only two regions in this country — Dublin and the rest. I am a representative of the south-east region and we have the lowest per capita income, the highest levels of unemployment of any region in the country and the lowest levels of third level entrants. Such a debate would be useful but it should cover the whole country.

I ask the Deputy Leader, as someone who is involved in agriculture, to ask the Minister for Agriculture and Food to come into the House and outline the measures the Government is taking to ensure we do not have an outbreak of avian influenza here and, if such an outbreak takes place, the measures the Government will put in place to handle it. I listened in horror yesterday to a man from Waterford outline on the national airwaves his attempts to make contact with various Government agencies and Departments over the weekend about a dead bird he found.