David Norris (Independent)

I support Senator Alex White's call for a debate on the economy, which is well overdue. I am not anything of an economist, but even I am concerned when there are reports in the newspapers to the effect that the former Taoiseach, Deputy Bertie Ahern, is to approach some banking friends with a view to a dig-out and that these include J. C. Flowers, Carlyle and so on, with their associations to the Bush family, Mr. bin Laden's close relatives and so on. If these people are to come in and do a Tony O'Reilly on it, as he did with Eircom, the Irish taxpayer should be given a shot at it. If they are going to be able to get in and out within five years and make enormous profits, why do we not do it? That would be a useful employment of the pension funds. We should make a profit out of our own industry and kick the banks, if that is needed.

I also believe that we need a debate on the economy. As a simple person, I am astonished at the way matters are being managed. The British Chancellor of the Exchequer is reducing VAT while simultaneously we are putting it up. To add what Margaret Thatcher would have called the triple whammy, Dublin Corporation is shoving 3.5% on to the rates for businesses in central Dublin. That should make a happy Christmas for everybody. I notice there is a secular Christmas tree — there is no sign of a crib — sponsored by the Dublin City Centre Business Association. I doubt if its members will have such a happy Christmas, as might have been envisaged.

I support Senator Labrás Ó Murchú in regard to FÁS. The reports are disturbing and at a time of severe economic retrenchment it is provocative and aggravating to see the apparently exotic lifestyle of some of these people at the top of FÁS. I was not very impressed by the performance of the chief executive, although of course he was in a corner. He seemed to be trying to maintain two contradictory positions at the same time. He said one needed to go first class in order to arrive fresh at meetings. Then he said he did not cost the taxpayer any money because he had downgraded himself, not to economy class but to business class, in order to bring his wife with him at no extra cost to the taxpayer. He may have arrived comforted by the presence of his spouse, but I doubt whether he was as fresh as he might have been had he travelled solo in first class.