Willie O'Dea (Limerick City, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Deputy Butler said there is a wrong situation here which needs to be addressed and that we need unity in our approach, and I agree with him on that. Unfortunately, before we can jointly get together to make a push to achieve something we need to have some clarity as to what exactly we are trying to achieve. Mr. Fielding said the figure for the extra social insurance benefit to qualify would be 1.5%. That is based on a mandatory system, as the expert report stated. If social insurance is applied across the board to all the self-employed and everybody had to pay, the figure would be 1.5% to make the extension of these benefits cost-neutral. However, the Minister and her Department are saying, and I happen to agree with them on this occasion, that if there is a voluntary system, that 1.5% contribution will not work.

With regard to the voluntary, opt-in, opt-out system that some are recommending, nobody seems to have a figure for what would work with such a system. This is probably because it is contingent on a number of things which we do not yet know, such as how many people will sign up and so on. We want to progress this and to move ahead, but we have two different points of view coming across here from the witnesses who have come in. Some are opposed to a compulsory system and-----