Terry Leyden (Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Parlon, and his senior officials to the House.

This debate on the Appropriation Act 2006 is timely, since never before in recent years has there been such concentration on legislation and budgetary issues in the run-up to a general election. Nothing concentrates a politician's mind more than the electric chair or the date of the general election; both have a certain inevitability about them.