Patricia Stephenson (Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

As I said, we should not be pursuing what is outlined in this section without having the report, on which I have introduced an amendment under the next section. I will speak to my points again. We should not be pursuing this. We have no evidence that having additional Ministers will bring value for money. We have instances of misuse of public spending. It is no one's fault, but we now have a situation where there is a lack of public trust in decision-making on spending. Yesterday, for example, in respect of arts and culture, we heard about the issue with the €6 million. I am proposing that instead of pursuing this, we introduce an amendment with a request that the Government brings us a report within the next three months outlining the evidence, findings and facts to demonstrate that having these additional Ministries will provide better value for money and better services for people.