Liam Twomey (Wexford, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Based on what I have heard from the representatives of the many organisations who have appeared before the committee yesterday and today, there appears to be a sense that we are all living in silos with our own concerns. Politically speaking, there is a bit of that in that we all seem to have our own viewpoint. Deputy Boyd Barrett spoke about austerity. I believe we have come a long way in many respects in the four or five years since the crisis started.

Dr. Healy has asked if we have reached a tipping point. He pointed out that household debt is greater than GDP and that much of the money we borrowed in recent years was not so much to bail out the banks but to run public services - paying for gardaí, teachers and nurses. If we had taken a different tack four years ago and decided not to repay our debts and let our banks go bust, who can say what would have happened? The only country that did something along those lines was Argentina and it decimated people's lives for a period of time. Dr. Healy spoke about the lost generation. Argentina also had a lost decade which was very detrimental to households. While that country subsequently recovered, nobody would want to put the people of Ireland through what happened to Argentina at that time. There is a need to discuss that.

As we are now talking about the future, some interesting comments have been made this week. For instance, Dr. Healy spoke about how the labour market has managed and how social inclusion is organised. He is right in pointing out that it is a discussion that does not happen. I was taken by comments that were made by representatives of the housing agencies who appeared before the committee in the past two days. They maintain that about 15% or 16% of all housing stock should be social housing which would help to develop a national housing policy that might keep housing prices down while also ensuring we do not have large numbers of people going on housing lists or what has been described as being at the mercy of unscrupulous landlords. Some landlords are poor; many landlords are actually very good. We have not developed that policy as has been done in countries such as Germany where some people rent for their entire lives and there is no issue with it. It is not as if home ownership is the gold standard. We can move away from that. Even though the ICTU representatives have mentioned it, we have not really had that discussion. While I know this is a pre-budget submission, it could focus this committee on talking about it.

The following matter is almost verging on the ridiculous and is attracting considerable discussion. I am sure I will be called to many public meetings on it in coming weeks. The teacher unions are coming together calling for no more cuts to education when 92% of what is being spent on primary education goes on salaries. We are asked to balance budgets on a very minor proportion of the spending while people who are working it are organising for us to attend public meetings as if their salaries are disconnected from the discussion. Some sections of society have not faced up to what we have gone through in the past four years. Submissions in the past two days have demonstrated how very vulnerable sections of society have been left out of the discussion completely. I would have thought we would have heard more about it.

The ICTU representatives talked about the bank capitalisation and what will happen to mortgage arrears. From the committee's discussions with the banks last week, it is clear that all the banks will be looking for more taxpayers' money for further recapitalisation. Some of the major banks were hinting that dealing with the mortgage arrears will put them back into the position they were in a few years ago and they may seek more capitalisation. Do the witnesses agree? I presume they are watching these issues and that will have a major impact on the people ICTU represents. I feel it is an issue that needs to be discussed because it will have a huge impact on what happens in the country in coming years.

I believe there have been some reductions in certain reliefs. It is always good to highlight to the committee the negative effect tax reliefs have. I do not necessarily agree with Deputy Boyd Barrett that my party has a fixation with giving tax reliefs. Tax reliefs have been reduced considerably in recent years and we could accelerate that process. If people have concerns, they should be raised at this committee. It should not just be mentioned as an aside but we should be given the real information on it.

I would like people to give us as much information as possible. Yesterday and today, many of the groups have simply told us what they wanted. To be honest, some of it sounded like a wish list. I sat on this committee between 2002 and 2007 during the height of the Celtic tiger and witnessed such wish list presentations. The then Minister, Mr. Charlie McCreevy, used to appear like Santa Claus at the end of it to fill everybody's goody bag. It was a complete joke and, of course, we are now paying the consequence of that.