Peter Mathews (Dublin South, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the witnesses. I will take up Deputy Spring's comments about the realities and aggregates in lever-arch files containing informing and advising documents and papers, etc. Will the council be more radical, adventurous and courageous in dealing with matters affecting the 4.5 million citizens living in this country, with at least 1.5 million having had their lives ripped apart. My question is whether the council can be braver and more radical. Mr. Barnes indicated that we are legislators who make the tax code, and the OECD and G20, among others, are thinking about these matters, moving forward and deliberating on issues. We are moving into fog.

In the immediate interim we can say that companies report profits at approximately €75 billion per year, 10% of which is €7.5 billion and 6% of which is approximately €4.5 billion. That is a big uplift from what is actually paid. We are all for debating, discussion and considerations but in the meantime there are 1.5 million people comprised of 390,000 people who are long-term unemployed and 170,000 households or 500,000 people in deep mortgage distress, with an estimated 30,000 households where grandparents are using savings to prevent mortgages going into distress. I know that is happening. There are also 90,000 families or 275,000 citizens and souls on the housing waiting list. Fr. Peter McVerry has stated it is disgraceful that 5,000 people are sleeping on the streets. This is the stuff that does not appear in the cover letter of the German-Irish Chamber of Commerce, which sent us a book. It is in both German and English, and it had a self-congratulating cover letter outlining the "marvellous success" of the recovery programme to date. What country is it talking about?