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

To amplify the same argument, there is no emergency anymore. In fact, the only emergency is in the areas of housing and health. One could argue there is also an emergency in terms of poverty and deprivation, given that these conditions have increased exponentially. Any of the crises that has developed is linked, at least, to income cuts, of which the FEMPI legislation was a significant element in its imposition of reduced incomes on low and middle income earners and the knock-on effects on the economy and society. I did not agree with that income slashing, even during the crisis; I believed it was counterproductive and made a bad situation worse. Whatever about the justifications for it at the time, it seems that there is absolutely no justification for continuing emergency legislation that preserves many of the cuts and the deterioration in pay and conditions imposed under a heading, "Emergency Measures". It keeps them in place. It only partially gives back to people what they lost and still withholds a great deal in terms of pay and conditions. People lost vast amounts. I do not see how the Government can justify doing this. If anything, now is the time to give back what was taken in full because of the enormous sacrifices people made in the context of an emergency. The Government's attitude and response will determine how people will view what the recession meant because the Government narrative is, "We did not really like doing this, but we had to do it because it was an emergency".

Another widely believed narrative, to which I subscribe, is that the Government and the European elites generally pursued a strategy of "Never waste a good crisis" to get through measures they would unable to if they did not declare an emergency or if there was not an emergency atmosphere and will keep as much of it in place for as long as they can-----