Tom Shehan (Fine Gael)

Where would we be without Europe? What would be the alternative? Where would Ireland be now were it not for the EU, the IMF and the ECB? From where would we have obtained the money necessary to pay the salaries of gardaí, teachers, nurses and doctors? We need Europe, and perish the thought of the alternative if we did not have Europe backing us now. Some people mentioned a second bailout as a bad thought. Why is this so? We are currently getting funding at approximately 3% and if we had to go to the markets today, we would pay in excess of 6%. Why not line up a second bailout and money at 3%, as it would be prudent for the Government to have the facility available? Some people are afraid to mention it or talk about it but I am not. From a business perspective - running a country is fundamentally a business - the facility should be put in place. I urge the Government to make that facility available if needed.

The year 2006 was the turning point for this country. The public continually seeks people to blame for the country's current condition. People blame the banks, politicians and Europe, with some even going as far as to blame America, without looking at our own input to our current position. What stands out for me as a watershed is a statistic in the 2006 census, which showed there were 215,000 unoccupied houses in the country, with Government policy at the time to build 90,000 units per annum. That is where the country went wrong. Some 65,000 of the unoccupied houses were second homes, so there were approximately 150,000 unoccupied houses. The ESRI and bodies such as the OECD are now quoted daily in this and the other House, but in 2006, reports on which direction the Government should take were not heeded and were mainly ignored, and that led to our current problems.

We need Europe and size matters, as we are small peripheral country in the grand scheme of things. Through the years and different Governments, Ireland has punched above its weight in the European arena because of its pro-Europe stance. We have played the game well and although the process may happen over the long term, we have some very good allies in Europe.

Other people have raised the issue of the sale of State assets. A Government must have priorities. Is it a priority of the Government to grow trees over providing health care? Is it a priority for the Government to grow trees over spending €1.5 billion building new schools in its lifetime?