Opposition reaction: The failure to spend some €350 million on capital programmes this year was evidence that the Government's capacity to deliver infrastructure had broken down, the opposition claimed last night. Arthur Beesley reports.
As the individual parties found fault with the initiative to increase access to the medical card system, they also attacked Government failure to meet its commitment on overseas development aid.
Fine Gael's finance spokesman, Mr Richard Bruton, said it was clear that Ministers were engaged in horse-trading for capital expenditure and "jockeying to be first to local papers with the happy announcement".
Mr Bruton said the Government was moving further away from the notion of an integrated structural plan centred on the national spatial strategy, with no sign of the reforms needed to improve services in the public sector.
He said the Estimates focused on small changes in individual budgets instead of fundamental reform of the system. Additional funding in health since 1997 was not money well spent, he said, adding that the new medical card programme would not even bring access back to the level available when the Government took office.
"The capacity problems in our hospitals are not being confronted with capital budgets down sharply for a second year in a row," he said, adding that the Government's excessive reliance on stealth charges would continue.
Labour's finance spokeswoman, Ms Joan Burton, said the medical card initiative would create a three-tier health service in which some people could go to the doctor but would be unable to pay for medicine.
Ms Burton said the failure to include new capital spending in the package yesterday meant the Dáil debate on the Estimates would take place with a central element of the plan missing.
"Five weeks before Christmas, the Government doesn't yet know how much it wants to spend on capital projects next year. This takes their incompetence to a new level," she said.
Ms Burton said the failure to meet the target for overseas aid was a "national disgrace".
The Green finance spokesman, Mr Dan Boyle, said the Government had committed to spend less in real terms on environmental protection in 2005 than in the current year. This was because there was no change in percentage terms in 2004.
"Most shockingly in this area, the Environmental Protection Agency will see its budget cut by 4 per cent," Mr Boyle said. The 5 per cent rise in the allocation for Garda pay would not inspire confidence "that many or any of the long-promised 2,000 extra Garda will be brought on stream".
Sinn Féin's finance spokesman, Mr Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin, said it was clear the package signalled the start of Fianna Fáil's re-election campaign for 2007.
"Very belatedly, they are addressing some of the promises they left unfilled, most notably in the medical card area," he said.
But Mr Ó Caoláin said the medical card initiative fell short of the Government's commitment in 2002 to extend the entitlement for the cards to an additional 200,000 people.