Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

We now have with us Dr. Laura Bambrick, senior policy and legislative officer with ICTU. I welcome her to the meeting. I will let her contribute first if she wants to respond to some of the comments that have been made.

To follow on from Deputy Ó Cuív's points, the evidence that we have received this morning is that people on lower pay and in manual labour, women in particular, are disproportionately impacted upon by the increase in the pension age. We also know from the evidence given to us as part of our hearings that people on higher incomes benefit disproportionately from the tax relief on pensions. Is there a need to examine that relief and share it out in a more equitable way towards meeting the cost of State pensions?

In his evidence, Mr. Taft made the point that the healthy life expectancy was, on average, 12 years after the age of 66. Sadly, that may fall temporarily due to Covid-19. Is there merit in tying the retirement age into that benchmark? If it increases or decreases over the generations to come, could that be the benchmark used for determining the retirement age so that the average person would be guaranteed ten to 12 years of healthy life after retirement?

Ms Duffy made the point that 70% of carers were also in employment. Would she be prepared to comment on a question that I raised with the Minister for Finance on the floor of the House recently regarding the incapacitated child tax relief? The Minister referred to the 2009 Commission on Taxation, which recommended that this relief be removed, but Ms Duffy made the point that it could be used to help compile the carer register. Clearly, there is some thinking within the Department of Finance that we should be considering removing reliefs in respect of incapacitated children and older people.

I will start with Dr. Bambrick and then invite the other witnesses to conclude.