Martin Mansergh (Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Minister of State and his officials. I warmly welcome this social partnership agreement and it was appropriate that the Taoiseach came to this Chamber to present the agreement to the Oireachtas for the first time. This Chamber has a wisp of a ghost of vocational representation about it.

Social partnership has been essential to the economic success of this country in the past 20 years. I do not say it is the only cause of that success but it has been a major one. Our debt has reduced from 125% of GNP to between 25% and 30% and we have experienced a near doubling of employment. Taxes, both business and income, are far lower and real incomes have increased. As Senator O'Toole pointed out, there have been remarkable increases in productivity and improvements in industrial relations. One important commitment in the programme has already been delivered — before the agreement has been signed, sealed and ratified — namely the research package announced over the weekend.

Apart from the content of the specific agreements and commitments the most important thing about social partnership is that it is a method, based in the first instance on careful study and preparation. Earlier this afternoon we debated the reformation of NESC and NESF. Different subject sectors are carefully studied and prepared as part of the process. I suspect that in many cases the words are carefully weighed, though I accept that in some instances they are simply a résumé of reports and policies from other areas. Senator McDowell, for example, referred to the paragraph on air transport, which is not gobbledygook or fluff — every word is carefully weighed with trade unions.

I welcome the clear statement that the policy will in all cases be based on serving the public interest, to meet the needs of people to best effect without any ideological assumption as to what corporate structure or strategy best meets that objective. That needs to be stated over and over because we heard on the Order of Business this morning suggestions that health policy was based on some rabid ideological drive toward privatisation, of which there is no evidence whatsoever.

The agreement contains a good deal of flexibility, as it must. There is tremendous value in the fact that we have, in principle, a ten-year commitment to continuing social partnership, until 2016. There will have to be adaptability to circumstances and situations will change. Pay will be dealt with in several subsections of the agreement over two or three-year periods and certain aspects of the agreement may have to be reviewed. However, the point was made that fiscal policy allowed sufficient room for manoeuvre in circumstances that may arise in the future, which is very important for avoiding stop-go situations and dealing with emergencies which might give the economy a bumpy ride. We are in a position of considerable strength and we must allow ourselves a bit of room for manoeuvre.

I also welcome the commitment, in principle, to 5% capital investment. We can see the changes taking place in infrastructure throughout the country. Visitors to this country — I had lunch recently with an American professor — are enormously impressed by the sheer number of signs of activity of all kinds. Obviously, construction activity of one kind or another is visible.

As the Taoiseach pointed out, social partnership is attacked by both the hard left and the hard right. For example, the Sunday Independent contained an article last Sunday by somebody who is clearly deeply frustrated that this country is not run on Thatcherite lines where the unions would be put firmly in their place, would not darken the door of Government Buildings and so on. A Member of this House sometimes espouses a view not a million miles from that.