Ned O'Sullivan (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I smiled when I heard the Minister, Deputy Noonan, quoting Robert Frost about the road less travelled. The budget is on a very old familiar highway, or should I say autobahn, of election budgets. This is what has framed it. Another big black hole in the budget is the health Estimate. Minuscule percentages have been built into the health budget over the next three years, which we all know cannot be realised. History shows that supplementary budgets must be introduced for the health Estimate and this will be the same. We are playing with borrowed money in difficult times. Obviously it is an election budget.

I support what Senator Labhrás Ó Murchú stated on the 1916 celebrations. The 1916 Rising was organised by the IRB, which was a highly secretive organisation, although not nearly as secretive as the Government in its plans to deal with the commemoration. I welcome the announcement by the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, that she will come clean on it. We must all be part of it. This must be a national celebration. We have paid due homage to those who died in the Great War and John Redmond, and rightly so as I have stated previously. The seismic date in Irish history is 1916, whether we like it or not, and it has informed all modern democratic politics in Ireland since. The men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice need to be focused on singularly in order that we can have a proper, respectful and meaningful commemoration of their deeds. I would like less emphasis on the militaristic side and more on the radical proclamation which they brought forward and which has been an example to us all.