Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Believe it or not but I would agree with a lot of what Deputy Higgins has just said. There is an element, not only in the media, which wants to divide public sector workers and private sector workers. That is wrong. They are mutually dependent. Everybody in the State is dependent on decent public services when we or our family are sick, when our children go to school and when we want to feel secure on our streets with a decent level of policing. All of that is provided by public sector workers, and the private sector depends upon it.

I have no compunction in defending the public service but we are in a very broken position economically, and people know that. We need to work towards balancing our budget because no matter what else we do we cannot continue to heap debt upon the next generation. We are borrowing substantially more now than we are getting in tax revenues. We need to balance that equation, and we cannot endlessly tax. Deputy Higgins and others talk about some pot of gold taxes that is available. This is the budgetary process. If the Deputy has any suggestions he should submit them to me and we will have them costed, and any good suggestions will be seized upon.

In terms of the bailout fiasco, as the Deputy calls it, the bottom line is that last year we were dependent on the troika, that is the IMF, the European Central Bank and the European Commission, providing us with sufficient moneys to keep the country afloat. Without that we would have a disastrous reduction. If we had to downsize our public services to the amount that our income in tax revenue would fund it would have been a disaster. The only people who gave us affordable money last year, and this year, are the troika. If we had tried to borrow it on the markets it would have been unaffordable, if we could get it at all. That is the reality of it, and there is no escaping that.

I gave my view on the issue of increments. If we are looking for further reductions in the public pay bill we must be as creative as we can be and maintain an ongoing spending review.

We analysed the spending of public sector workers, including the spending of social welfare benefits, particularly in small rural towns. It is interesting that this expenditure accounts for a significant proportion of economic activity in many rural towns. We cannot suck this out without damaging the private sector. People seem to be a little blind to this. The spenders to whom I refer are those who ensure there is some commerce in the shops, pubs, restaurants, etc.

I totally disagree with Deputy Joe Higgins that the Croke Park agreement somehow represents the destruction of the public service. It is allowing reforms that are absolutely necessary. I am familiar with the Deputy's traditional views, as we spent ten years together on the administrative council of the Labour Party. We had to be in the room at the same time because, if we both left at the same time, there would have been an imbalance of votes. I know very well his views on outsourcing, for example. His campaign on bin charges caused the privatisation of the bin service.