This day last year the Taoiseach participated in a television debate prior to the general election. In the course of that debate he said that street violence is a very small aspect of crime. He said that if returned to Government, Fianna Fáil would eliminate waiting lists within two years and recruit a further 2000 gardaí. Let us look at what has happened one year on. The education building programme has been cut by €88 million. The national drugs funding strategy has been cut by €7 million. Government funding for FÁS and community employment schemes has been cut by €86 million. The first-time buyers' grant has been abolished and overseas aid has been cut by approximately €40 million.
How can the Taoiseach come into this House one year on, a year after he sent a letter, with the imprimatur of the Minister for Finance, to the leaders of the parties saying that no cuts were planned in public expenditure in secret or by any other means when we now have cutback after cutback, waiting lists increasing and the decimation of public services, which is far from what we were told? At the current rate of Garda recruitment, it would be 40 years before 2,000 extra gardaí are on the streets. Public crime has increased from 45 incidents per day in 1996 to 117 per day now. Hospital waiting lists have increased by 4,300 between June and September last year and the Government and the Minister for Health and Children have not published any figures since then. I could give other examples, as can others. Will the Taoiseach not now admit, one year on in his second term of office, that the letter sent out and what he said in a television debate this day last year was the biggest political lie ever perpetrated on the Irish people in the last decade?