Marc MacSharry (Fianna Fail)

I join others in welcoming the meeting that took place yesterday. It achieved a great deal in reaffirming all parties' commitment to the 3% deficit by 2014, and that was very positive. I fully agree with Senator Alex White that it is important there be difference as we consider the tangibles that will get us in that direction, on which we are all agreed, of 3%. Of course it is important that there is difference because otherwise it is just public administration. If I have a suggestion on a taxation measure, it is important that people criticise it and tease it out. That is what I would like to see in the debates that take place. If Ministers are coming to the House next week to consider what we think should be in the budget, I do not want to hear what the Minister wants in the budget, rather what the Members of this House suggest should be in the budget. That is what politics is about and why our positions exist - to add, on behalf of the people, our tuppence worth to what should be in the budget.

I welcome the publication of the ESRI report, which has many good things in it and will focus minds. As Senator Regan correctly noted, there are no longer any sacred cows. We now have official recognition from the ESRI that we may have to adjust aspects of the Croke Park agreement as we contemplate the measures that will take us on our journey. I also agree with the Senator that aspects of the report are unhelpful. It is not helpful, for instance, to announce before we begin, as it were, that the target is the wrong one. Let us first see how we go towards meeting it.

If, as we approach 2014, the target of 3% is too far off, it may be possible, as the Minister for Finance stated last night, to extend the deadline. I share the view expressed by Dan O'Brien in today's edition of The Irish Times that it would be preferable to take such a step "when the deficit is lower, the banking system sounder, the bond market calmer, the euro construct stabler and the world economy stronger". It would be foolish in the extreme - Dan O'Brien uses the word "insanity" - to announce at this stage that we will not adhere to the target to the fullest extent possible.

I ask the Leader to arrange four debates next week on taxation, health, education and social welfare, respectively. The purpose of these debates should not be to listen to the relevant Ministers prescribe tonics for the budget but to enable Senators from all sides to make suggestions on where savings can be made.