Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)

Where are those calculations? It is appalling that we are having a debate which is tantamount to a revision of the budget and the Estimates. We still do not have any tax forecasts or tables spelling out the tax buoyancy impact, nor do we have any analysis of the new forecast. The Minister has abandoned the forecast he had at the time of the budget and we do not have any analysis of his new forecast for tax or for spending. The few pages published in the depths of a Friday night is all we have seen from the Minister's Department to give us a revised framework, even for 2009, let alone for 2010 and 2011.

There is no credibility in what the Minister is offering. How can we have confidence when his Department, as the Minister said, having failed three times last year to get its tax forecasts right has now produced a new one and we do not even see the basis of the forecast or how it has disaggregated between income tax, VAT and stamp duty? That is not good enough. The Minister cannot come into this House and call this a serious debate about the need to find €2 billion when all the i's are not dotted and the t's not crossed. We must see proper analysis to allow us have a mature debate about this and reflect on it. Our job is to criticise, scrutinise and try to get the best from this measure, and I do not see that.

We need something that is available in other countries, namely, a fiscal responsibility code where there is independent assessment of the fiscal policy and an obligation on the Minister, if it is going off the rails, to come back into the House and tell us what has gone wrong and the corrective measures that will be introduced. We have not had that in this country and it is about time we introduced it.

It appears that the pension levy is riddled with unfairness in the way it is being structured. People on low income derive no pension benefit from the public service pension now. They get their social welfare pension and on co-ordination they get a very small amount of extra benefit yet they will pay the levy at 3%, even though they are on the minimum wage. In key income ranges the rate of the levy goes up and down because of the impact of tax relief. For instance, at €30,000 people pay a 4.6% levy net, at €40,000 it drops to 4.1% and at €35,000 it is 5%. It drops by a full percentage point between €35,000 and €40,000. Many people are in those ranges and having a topsy-turvy system that imposes more burden on the lower paid in those ranges does not make sense. We must see the pensions benefit profile to determine if that is fair.

If one were to do an actuarial calculation the pension benefit of someone appointed Secretary General is probably 40%. The pension benefit of someone who is a porter in the same office is perhaps 6%. He or she is already paying 6%. The person who is getting the 40% is paying 6%. The Minister is asking the person already paying the full amount to pay an additional 3% and he is asking the person at the top to pay 9% more. There is no equity regarding the pension benefit in the way the Minister is allocating this burden. Calling it a pension levy when it is not related to the pension benefit is very difficult for people to stomach.

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