Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

It is difficult for the Minister to sustain the argument that his approach to these matters is in the round progressive against a background whereby we have a month-on-month deterioration in the financial situation of low and middle-income households. The most stark testimony of this is the Irish League of Credit Unions surveys, which have shown dramatic increases even over a three-month period in the severity of the financial situation of hundreds of thousands of families in the country.

Tax policy cannot be separated from policy generally or from all the policies that affect people's financial situations and, consequently, the wider economy. It is clear that low and middle-income people are being driven under and are in severe financial distress and that this leads to devastation of the high street.

The Minister uses a mantra he should be forced to justify more often, saying that all of this is being done because to do it in the way we suggest - by increasing the tax burden on those on higher earnings - would be a tax on jobs. His mantra is that doing it his way is the way to create jobs and to encourage foreign direct investment. Will he please give us some evidence to back up those assertions? This is at the heart of people's concerns and is what our tax policy should be geared towards. Is this policy helping to create jobs and is it facilitating greater investment? I am sorry to say the Minister has not provided, nor can he provide, any evidence to back up his assertions.

The Minister has pointed to a marginal increase in investment in the private sector. However, in the round, investment has collapsed by over 60% since 2008.