The Minister for Finance, Brian Cowen, has strongly defended the government's record on public spending in the face of opposition claims that much of the money is wasted.
Speaking today at the ICPA annual business lecture today Minister Cowen said that the vast bulk of government spending achieves exactly what it is supposed to and does so efficiently.
He said he was putting it back to the Opposition to point out how spending on more teachers,nurses, consultants, or social welfare payments was a waste of money.
The Minister also rejected a suggestion from the Economic Social Research Institute (ESRI) earlier this week that the government would damage the economy by engaging in a pre-election spending binge. He said the government's record was not one of damaging but was one of building up.
Minister Cowen insisted that he will engage in responsible policies in relation to the budget. He said that social welfare, health, education and capital investment dominate the budget and will account for almost 80% of planned expenditure of just over €50 billion.
The Minister said €13.5 billion or over one quarter of total expenditure goes to social welfare, the vast bulk of which goes directly to funding social welfare payments benefiting almost 1.5 million people.
