They have a new jargon today.

Ciúnas anois.

I wish to raise the issue of policing and anti-social behaviour on the north side of Dublin. I am getting increasing exasperated with the failure to get any answers in this Chamber. I tabled a Commencement matter on anti-social behaviour issues, muggings and the escalation of violence in the Dublin 9 area and the Minister who replied to the matter told me that the Minister had no direct responsibility for the area and that it was an issue for the Garda Commissioner. I then raised in another debate the potential for the opening of a Garda station in the expanding Clongriffin-Balmayne area, which will have 50,000 residents in a number of years, and again I was told it was an issue for the Garda Commissioner. Now I have asked this week for a debate after a pipe bomb incident in Edenmore last Sunday, following a gun attack in a pizza parlour in Edenmore on New Year's eve, only to be told by the Leas-Chathaoirleach that I cannot have it because the Minister has no official responsibility in the matter. I am getting sick and tired of this kind of response. We all hear from a Minister in government in Stepaside who tells every resident that can hear him that it was his intervention that opened up a Garda station in that plush affluent suburb-----

With the crime statistics going down.

-----against the express advice of an assistant Garda commissioner. Yet when we have had a pipe bomb incident and an attempted murder in a pizza parlour in Edenmore, I am told by the Leas-Chathaoirleach's office that the Garda Commissioner is the person responsible and the Minister for Justice and Equality has no responsibility for it.

Operational policing matters are a matter for the Commissioner and not the Minister.

I am damn sure that if there was a pipe bomb in Laois or in south Dublin, the Minister would be all over it.

I must ask the Senator to resume his seat.

I am sick and tired of getting answers-----

I do not care how sick and tired the Senator is. I have made a ruling.

-----from the Minister for Justice and Equality stating that this is not his responsibility.

The Senator will now resume his seat.

I do not make a northside-southside point very often but I am sick of being told-----

The Senator is out of order.

-----that the Garda Commissioner is the person who is responsible for resources, not the Minister for Justice and Equality.

This letter is a disgrace. How am I supposed to go back-----

The Senator is not going to raise it here.

-----to the people we represent and say they are getting-----

The Senator knows as well as I do that operational policing matters are a matter for the Garda Commissioner and not the Minister.

This letter that I got from you is a disgrace.

If the Senator is unhappy with that letter, he can take it up with the Cathaoirleach and the Committee on Procedure and Privileges.

It is an absolute disgrace-----

The Senator is out of order. I ask him to resume his seat.

I say once more that I am demanding-----

The Senator is not demanding anything. He is out of order.

I do not give a fiddler's; I want a debate with the Minister for Justice and Equality in here about Garda-----

Is the Senator going to continue like this? Is he going to continue to disobey the Chair?

-----resources on the northside of Dublin.

The Senator is gone a minute over his time. Will he sit down, please?

It is unbelievable that you would send me a letter-----

I sent the Senator a letter and I stand over it.

-----advising me that the Minister has no responsibility in this area.

I have told the Senator why I sent him the letter. Now sit down.

If there was a pipe bomb in any other area of the city-----

The Senator should resume his seat.

-----I am quite sure we would get major political responsibility for it.

I have told the Senator he can raise this with the Cathaoirleach.

This is a disgrace.

Is the Senator going to resume his seat?

The Chair can understand why certain communities feel they will get no representation from this Government. It is a disgrace.

Sit down. The Senator is totally out of order.

The Senator will make the headlines

Order, please. Be respectful.

I want to touch on the issue of the children's hospital, what has been said here and the fact that the cost overruns are escalating to in the region of €2 billion.

The famous Austrian-born but American business and management consultant, Peter Drucker, once said that management by objectives works but it only works where the objectives are correct. Clearly, the objectives relating to the children's hospital were not correct. The scope of the project, we now know, was all over the place and was not clear. While the Minister is far removed from the day-to-day management operations of the project, nonetheless, the buck stops with him.

We can criticise the children's hospital all we want but this is going to happen again and again. We saw it with the Luas and the port tunnel. The public sector in general, irrespective of which Government is in control, is unable to manage a budget allocation. The financial scrutiny and financial framework need to be in place right at the beginning of a project, and that includes the site selection, which was all over the place for this project so that, ultimately, a political decision selected the site. We now know that it is, in fact, the wrong site, and any cursory glance at the financials shows that the project is involved in all sorts of operations that are nothing to do with a children's hospital.

Accountability must begin somewhere. Officials within the Department of Health and the HSE must be held accountable. This is another glaring example of the lack of accountability within the HSE. We have the resignation of one chief executive, who is replaced by another. The Minister for Health is before the health committee today but all he will do is defend the increase in spending and provide a rationale for it. There is a bigger issue, which is the national planning framework, a massive injection of capital spending over the next 20 years. We now see that the State does not have the capacity, the financial framework or the financial oversight capability to implement that.

The time is up.

It is regrettable that Dáil Éireann voted against an amendment, which was accepted in this House and which proposed that we would have a vote on the national planning framework. That is not happening because Deputies voted it down, which, in my view, was disgraceful and short-sighted.

I thank the Senator.

I ask that the Ministers for Health, Finance and Public Expenditure and Reform come before this House so we can have a discussion on the State's capital expenditure programme.