Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)

It is good to see that the Government is at least consistent. In good times and bad it keeps things constant; it may disappoint the nation, but it never disappoints the construction industry.

I also put forward the view that there should not be any cut in the capital programme and workers, tradespeople and craftsmen could be transferred from the collapsed residential housing sector into other areas of the construction industry such as schools, roads and other infrastructure projects. The problem is that the major party in Government, Fianna Fáil, has been in office for more than ten years. It has claimed credit on every occasion that the sun shone. However, the Government fell asleep in that comfort zone and became immune to the realities of what is happening on the street. It ignored the warning signs that were put up in flares for long enough on a range of issues. The Government has been too lazy, too stale, too arrogant, too out of touch with the pressured lives of the mortgaged poor.

Yesterday, the Minister for Finance, having already likened himself to the American President who dragged his nation out of a depression, went even further in his presumption, in his out of touch impertinence; he called for patriotism when the Government expects every person to pay for its wanton waste and its playing free and easy and reckless with the economy and the taxes of the people. Instead of spending the next few days spinning this disaster to the media, the Taoiseach should try meeting some of the people who are now impoverished, whose standard of living will drop, who are being punished. He should try telling these exhausted men and women about the patriotic action they are taking today in paying for the Government's outrageous and reckless mistakes.

I can promise the Taoiseach if he does this, he will get a short, two-word answer from them. It is very easy for a Government that stopped listening to reality a long time ago to talk about patriotism. However, if it matches its high-flown words to the real world outside this House it will quickly find that brand of patriotism rejected with heavy losses. The people know how badly they have been served. They know the Taoiseach and the Government he struggles to lead have achieved the unbelievable; they have produced disaster out of success. They have turned a surplus of €6 billion into a €15 billion deficit. For the first time in the history of the State they have reversed progress and condemned hard working people and families to a lower living standard than their parents and in some cases, their grandparents enjoyed. The Government has reversed the standard of living and the quality of life for hundreds of thousands of families. That is some achievement by the Taoiseach and the Minister for Finance in a short time. They have switched this country from a position of surplus to massive deficit.

The Taoiseach shmoozed his way through the last four budgets, dispensing gifts of government expenditure to all and sundry, without any regard to the consequences. Everything was sound. Anybody who mentioned any difficulties with this economy was guilty of national sabotage and talking down our country. Last May, when the Taoiseach was still claiming that the fundamentals of the economy were sound, what planet was this Government living on? The Taoiseach was asked at the time to explain his economic rescue plan. He knew we were facing financial difficulties of the most serious type. There was no response from the Taoiseach. Yesterday's budget did not reveal any plan. It is a series of tax levies and tax takes on every taxpayer and worker. Yesterday's budget fixed no fundamental problems and it ensured no future. It is without hope, without aspiration or without inspiration and it does not offer any enthusiasm to anybody with any initiative. It is a pick-and-mix punishment to a hardworking nation. One of the headlines in a newspaper today states: "All pain but no gain". It is a desperate budget introduced by a desperate Government. This is panic, not policy; it is denial, not direction.

The Government has tried to hide its miserable performance behind the international banking crisis. Every time a television is turned on, the excuse is that it is America, Japan, China or Europe. People have become blurred with the trillions and billions and the economic statistics. We all know the difficulties that are so complex for so many countries as a result of the international banking and global situation. We know the Government did not cause this crisis and it is not responsible for the sub-prime sector in the United States which is another word for reckless spending but it is responsible for the reckless spending in this economy. The Taoiseach should not try to tell the House that the international global financial position is responsible for the costs associated with doing business here, for the fact the Government has never opened up competition, from Dublin Bus to the provision of broadband, to the provision of energy, to the regulation in all this area. The Government has allowed a situation to apply where it is now one of the costliest countries in the eurozone in which to do business, despite the references in the Taoiseach's speech to easy setting up costs for companies. The Taoiseach has allowed a situation to come about where it is virtually impossible to do business, between regulation, cost and the beating down of small businesses. Before this time next year, there will be hundreds of retail outlets closed down because they cannot pay the commercial water charges, never mind meet the commercial rates being applied by local authorities. The answer from the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government has been to change the light bulbs and give people bicycles.

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