Dominic Hannigan (Labour)

I welcome the Minister to the house and congratulate him on his recent appointment. I am glad that Fine Gael tabled this motion because with a new Taoiseach and Cabinet, it is essential to have a full and frank debate as early as possible on the economy. There are many reasons why our economy boomed in the past ten years. Many of these are due to external factors. They have not been in the control of the Government but have been due to factors from outside, such as the World Trade Organisation and economic growth in the United States. It is true that some reasons for our growth have been due to internal factors, for instance the corporation tax rates, but these were introduced by my colleague, Deputy Ruairí Quinn, not by the former Minister for Finance, Charlie McCreevy, nor by Deputy Brian Cowen when he was Minister for Finance.

Much of the growth we have seen is due, not alone to Fianna Fáil's stewardship of the economy but to ourselves and others. Now there is a need for real stewardship because along with the slowdown in economic growth comes a reduction in employment. Only last month the figures for unemployment showed a rise of 5.5% on the previous year. That cold figure hides a lot of hardship. In Meath, for instance, the live register figures have gone up by 1,430 in the year to April 2008. Kells has seen an increase of 236 people on its register. That means 236 families are now suffering and having to re-adjust their lifestyles to cater for their new economic situation.

We are losing jobs fast and in two ways. There is an almost constant loss of international companies that leave Ireland for cheaper workforces elsewhere. The construction industry, which up to recently was extremely busy, is in rapid decline. We can disagree about the reasons for this and disagree also about the quality of the handling of the economy to date. However, I believe we all agree that now is the time for effective stewardship. The economy can be steered in the right direction by investing heavily in technology, infrastructure, education and tourism. Ireland must be an attractive and viable destination for international businesses. We fall short, however, in areas such as access to quality broadband. Often this is a deal-maker when it comes to businesses from abroad moving here. Last year the Communications Regulator wrote a report outlining the supply of broadband to many rural areas. It stated that almost all the businesses in these areas still used dial-up, not because they wished to, but because no broadband was available.

Senator Dan Boyle — who was referred to earlier as Dan Brown — has said that nothing else can be done. I would prefer to believe Dan Brown on this issue rather than Dan Boyle. Clearly, things can be done. We must invest in quality broadband. The Government has been very slow to roll out broadband across the country and as it has struggled the technology has moved on. The cutting edge of broadband is found in places such as Japan where up to 100 megabytes per second can be achieved. In most European countries the speeds are between ten and 15 megabytes per second. In Ireland we are lucky to get three or four per second. One would wonder how a nation that is serious about trying to be a First World country can survive on Third World technology when it comes to broadband. We must set our minds to discover how to make Ireland an attractive 21st-century country for 21st-century jobs. We need investment in broadband, in roads and rail services, and in education.

Senator Boyle said that very little else could be done. I would like to remind him of these words:

The Government's failure to commit modest funding required for the implementation of the McIvor report shows that it is still failing to invest in the domestic skills base. Irish industry and the Irish educational sector, will, I believe, join me in saying that this represents a serious misjudgment.

In effect this person is saying that we will lose out when it comes to jobs and the economy because of not implementing the McIvor report on third level education and by not investing in education. The quotation was taken from Senator Dan Boyle's website in December 2005. Things can be done. Senator Boyle is in Government now and can get the McIvor report implemented. However, we have not heard him suggest this, so I remind him of his statement of 2005.

We advocate investment in broadband, further investment in education and in public sector projects. These will help to ensure that we continue to see economic growth. We all worry that the boom years have perhaps been wasted to some degree. There has been no improvement in health and underinvestment in our rapidly growing schools. Few people now can afford houses. Senator O'Malley does not seem to have a problem about negative equity. The truth is that many people bought houses at the top of the market at low mortgage rates in the hope that they could re-mortgage in a couple of years. They cannot re-mortgage now for lower rates because their loan devalue is not what they had hoped to achieve. Given the deficit in their loans in comparison to the value of the house they are not going to get cheaper mortgages. This costs people money. The issue is not about moving house, rather it is about people who might wish to re-mortage suffering because of negative equity. It is unfair and ill-informed to suggest otherwise.

We believe that the Government lazed its way through the economic boom and now it is time for real stewardship. I saw the ESRI report this morning. Perhaps that organisation is correct in predicting that we will be lucky and will see growth rates of 3.5% a year but we will not get it by default. We must work for it. If the Government is serious about achieving those rates it must invest, in education, in broadband and in industries such as tourism.