Joanna Tuffy (Dublin Mid West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I will make some brief points. On Senator Moloney's point, we must get out the message that everybody in our society is making their contribution. I understand that in other countries, including the Nordic countries, people on the equivalent of our social welfare make some contribution along the lines of what Senator Moloney stated. People must give something to get something back, but that should be done across our society in a redistributive way. In recent years an entire section of people who may have been long-term unemployed would have got social welfare, and there would be resentment about that. I accept that may be unjustified but the idea of everybody contributing to our recovery should be examined.

Regarding the pre-budget audit, the Oireachtas has implemented an all-year process. We are in the first part of that. We had a substantial number of pre-budget meetings with the Minister for Education and Skills and the Minister for Social Protection in which we went through a great deal of information. On the point about kite flying, there was a great deal of kite flying last year but much of what is in the public domain now is not kite flying. It is information that has come out from Oireachtas meetings and reports that have been put into the public domain, as well as information gleaned from parliamentary questions asked by TDs. We must be careful not to label everything as kite flying because the only people who can kite fly are Ministers. The idea is that they put out the information to gauge public reaction but that is not what a backbench or an Opposition TD does when he or she makes a suggestion.

I have another concern about what Dr. Healy proposed. There is a group of people which meets with people who are poor and those who are struggling on a daily basis. They are TDs. People come to our clinics. That is the reason I resent the idea that there is something wrong with what is called clientelism because it is voters contacting their TDs about their concerns and the way decisions affect them in their lives. There is an issue about representative democracy. We could not have a process such as the partnership process which tried to replace directly elected representatives. I flag that concern but that is not to say that I am not favourably disposed to the idea Dr. Healy proposed.