Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)

To be abundantly clear, I fully agree with the Senator. Irish savers are depriving themselves of a better return on hard-earned savings. A huge opportunity exists now, particularly in the context of the savings and investments union of the EU Commission, which, as the Senator said, only today published a recommendation on a new savings and investment account. The Irish Government has been a very strong supporter of the savings and investments union, and now the responsibility comes back to the Irish Government to interrogate the recommendations from the Commission this morning and come forward with proposals for Irish savers. A lot of good work has been done in the context of the funds review and the recommendations that emanated from that, and we as a Government need to push ahead with the implementation of those recommendations. We also need to come forward with a concrete proposal on a new savings and investment account. I am meeting my colleague the Minister, Deputy Donohoe, later today to discuss just that and how this budget next week can, I hope, commence with measures that will incentivise people to be more ambitious with their savings, thereby getting a better return for themselves, and invest in products that the Irish Government will be able to use to reinvest to make up our infrastructure deficit. I thank the Senator for having given me an opportunity to raise here today what is a very topical issue.