Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

So people receive wages and the value of those wages must be maintained. The point has been made, and rightly so, that the budget will come down to choices and targeted measures. The Government has increased the taxation package up to €1 billion. After one subtracts the public pay agreement, there will be less than €2 billion in discretionary expenditure. Once social welfare increase are taken out of that, we are talking small numbers. Mr. Barnes has argued that we need targeted measures. He also stated that we need to ensure that we do not have second-round effects. Taxation is quite expensive. Is it a case, therefore, that indexation of the standard rate band would, at this point, be an appropriate targeted measures in light of what we are seeing in the context of inflation?