Seymour Crawford (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)

As one of the signatories to it, I support this amendment. I cannot help admiring the way it is put forward in the Bill, "Set off of payments". That is lovely language, but in reality it is attachment to earnings. This is an extremely serious matter. Already, I have had to deal with a few of them which have been dealt with in other areas such as REPS. When somebody becomes ill or whatever, the person can find himself or herself in arrears and suddenly find that all their income is taken from them. I had an aged lady with me the other day with a nice sheet from a Department detailing all that she was owed and another piece of paper where the cheque should have been stating "No payment". That is not much good to that man and woman trying to meet their bills. Clearly, that is where we are coming from.

The power of attachment is a serious matter. There is no sense of what was quoted in the Dáil, that there would be a sympathetic understanding of the matter. It should be subject to negotiations so that X euro debt could be paid over a number of years but the way this is written it is clearly to be taken out of whatever income is available, whether through area aid, REPS, the single payment or even, as Deputy Naughten stated already, going as far as the milk cheque, the mart cheque or whatever.

This is extraordinarily lethal legislation. I well remember going through the development plan in my county council and getting an absolute assurance from the county manager who stated, "Let it go in, we will never implement it". I am in no doubt that the then manager, Mr. Joe Gavin, was a gentleman who stuck to his word until his last day there——

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