Marc Ó Cathasaigh (Waterford, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I will keep it relatively brief and tight. First, I welcome this legislation. We discussed it well at this committee. I welcome the straw man approach, which is very good and gives us something to respond to. People are increasingly beginning to understand that the straw man approach is not necessarily the fixed item but it gives you something to respond to. In a perfect case in point here, we made the case for the tapering over the nine months and that was taken on board. It is good to see that positive response coming back when the committee gives time over to an issue. As I said, it is a good idea in principle. It was proven during the time of the pandemic unemployment payment that the basic rate of social welfare was not sufficient for people's needs, which was why we increased it to €350. It will give people a chance to change their finances over that nine-month period. I think it is described as a strong attachment to the labour market but we do know that in normal circumstances, certainly in the current economy, a lot of people who leave their job will quickly move into another employment. I do not think we anticipate many people in the current environment getting to the end of that nine-month period without re-entering employment. That is one question I am going to put, because this is fine legislation in the current economy. I have one main concern which is the possibility of seeing an employment shock like we got around 2008 for example, where a large number of people became unemployed in a short space of time. Ms Harrington has given an estimate of a full-year cost of this scheme running to €130 million but has the Department stress-tested that against larger economic shocks? A government of the day will make choices in terms of social welfare provision but also in respect of the provision of services X, Y and Z. We saw that during the downturn. One of my concerns here is that we build a system that cannot withstand that level of economic shock. You might ask what system could withstand the level of shock that we saw in 2008 and so on.

The other issue I want to raise is around the PRSI increase. I am sure the Chairperson and other members of the committee are hearing about this as well, particularly from small businesses. What I am hearing is not about the PRSI increase in particular but that there is a PRSI increase, an energy price increase and an input increase, as well as the effects of auto enrolment and sick pay. Leaving inflation to one side, those extra benefits for employees are all good things and are all things I would advocate for. When the Department had that public consultation, what level of feedback did it receive from employers around the PRSI increase in particular? Do they think this is fair? We have the solidarity principle, which is one of the things that underpins our social protection system and we have the contributory principle. This legislation goes towards that feeling that as I have made a contribution, if I hit on bad times there is something that I can draw on. I want to make sure, however, that we are not putting small businesses in a more difficult situation by virtue of the legislation we are looking at here.