Seán Kenny (Dublin North East, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute on the spring statement. It is not next year's budget and does not contain the sort of detail or specifics of a budget. Rather, it is a picture of the economy at this point in time. It is about stating where we are now as an economy and how that compares with from where we have come. It is about stating where we want to go as an economy and a society.

The spring statement is a first step indicating the Government's strategy for managing the economy until the year 2020 and making the most of the economic upturn that is under way so that opportunities for our people, society and economy can be maximised. The economic upswing is at a point where the Government has the flexibility to change and improve some of the factors that people want addressed. As legislators, we cannot implement every initiative we would like. We do not have the resources to do so. In the next budget, the Government will have between €1.2 billion and €1.5 billion extra, which can be used in a sensible and sustainable way, given the strength of the performance of the economy at the moment. We must manage this extra money. Debate will be held in full public view in the national economic dialogue in Dublin Castle early this summer.

When I returned to the Dáil in 2011 after more than a decade away, I wondered what exactly we would see in 2015. Would the situation be as dark as it was in 2011 or better? I am happy to say that the situation is much better than it was in 2011. The Department of Finance is predicting 4% growth in the economy this year. If this prediction is met, Ireland will once again rate as the fastest growing economy in the EU. Consumer spending is up, as is business investment. Our national debt as a percentage of GDP is falling quickly and our economic targets have been exceeded. Most important, employment is continuing to rise and unemployment is continuing to fall.

In the last budget, the Government reduced the marginal rate of tax for people earning less than €70,000 and increased the level of income at which the marginal rate was payable. This will, broadly speaking, continue to be the approach in the taxation package for 2016. Low and middle-income earners will still be the priority, the low paid will continue to be removed from the USC net and taxes for those on middle incomes will be lowered progressively. We will implement an increase in the national minimum wage if that is recommended by the low pay commission.

The crisis greatly reduced the scope to improve services. It was a case of protecting them as best as we could while fighting to regain our economic sovereignty. In this year's budget, we made provision for more nurses, teachers and special needs assistants, SNAs. We are recruiting new gardaí for the first time since the collapse of the economy. All of this has come about as a new way of managing economic policy. The old-style Fianna Fáil way of spending and splurging during an unsustainable boom before cutting drastically when the boom stopped had to cease.

When I was a Deputy in the 1990s, the rainbow coalition got the economy back on track. Fianna Fáil took over power in 1997. By the time it had to give up the reins in 2011, it had made such a disaster of the economy that the troika of the European Central Bank, the European Commission and the IMF needed to be called in. This Government has seen off the troika and the reckless Fianna Fáil economic model. The new model is one of prudence and forward planning.

Despite Sinn Féin's protestations to the contrary, it knows and understands what the Government is doing. It is in government in the North and knows what it is to govern. It knows what it is like to have to make cuts because it has done so. It is implementing cuts made by the Tory government governing from Westminster. Sinn Féin is getting on with things, and without a protest, at what it is expected to do as Members of the devolved Assembly. The political approach of Sinn Féin is to propose one set of politics in the Twenty-six Counties while implementing the exact opposite in the other Six Counties.

Our country is in a much better place than it was four years ago when the Government took office. However, despite the positivity, the recovery is not yet secure. There may be setbacks, whether at home or abroad. We hope this will not happen but it might and a good Government will be prepared for it. Fianna Fáil was never prepared for it. Sinn Féin would not be either.

The country needs stable government and responsible management of our economy.

It needs parties in government which, even if there are bumps in the road at some points, are able and willing to face up to the social challenges of our time. We do not need and cannot afford the instability and mismanagement that would be inevitable if Fianna Fáil and Sinn Féin were in government.

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