Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I do. I think the context there is that, as I said earlier, 18.4% of the national income is the level of support that the Irish Government has put in play. It is an unprecedented level of State expenditure. The State has never been more involved in the economy than now because of the pandemic. I would ordinarily have thought that such a position was something that Deputy Barry would have embraced.

In terms of the reviews, we want to get people back to work and we want to get sectors reopened in the economy. If we can, that will be a natural reduction in some of those expenditures, be it the employment wage subsidy scheme, EWSS, the Covid restrictions support scheme, CRSS, or the pandemic unemployment payment. We do not want to hit the economy with measures that could restrict the growth of the economy in 2021 and 2022.

That is why there is a view that the idea of a Covid-19 solidarity tax is not something that the Government is minded to do. Government is not minded to do that right now. Government wants to assist and facilitate recovery rather than choke it off unnecessarily, although I am not saying one issue on its own will choke it off. That philosophy will govern how we emerge from Covid-19. We want to try to reposition the economy so that we can create jobs and get sectors that have been hit hardest back up and running.

We have to look attentively at the sectors that have been hit hardest. I have identified some of them and they include hospitality, tourism, travel, aviation, entertainment, music and the arts. All these sectors have suffered greatly as a result of Covid-19. We have borrowed a vast amount of money to sustain this period. We are in a position to be able to do that given the role of the European Central Bank in underpinning the sovereigns throughout Europe and the collective way Europe has approached this. That is why we took the approach we did in terms of the idea spoken about by the Deputy. That is how we see it.

We have a progressive tax system in Ireland. Those on higher incomes are taxed more. That is a fact of the Irish taxation model.

There is a balance here. We want to try to create and grow enterprise as we emerge from the pandemic. We want to create new opportunities for people to create jobs as well. GDP is forecast to expand by 4.5% this year and 5% next year. Modified domestic demand is probably a more useful indicator and that is projected to go up by 2.5% this year and to reach 7% next year, which is significant. There are large amounts of savings. Can we trigger some of that back into the economy?

We have to work on many issues. We are looking at developmental things. How do we get construction back up and running? How do we get greater delivery on the construction side? How do we get more houses built in 2021 and 2022? These are key parts of the agenda. Can we get the skills side of that sector up and running? The reason for the launch of the national apprenticeship programme is to get far more apprentices into the field to back up the national electrical programme and several initiatives we have under way. We also need to continue to develop our health services post pandemic and learn lessons from it.