James Bannon (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)

The Government's public sector pension levy is unfair, imbalanced and ill-conceived. It is designed to hit low and middle income earners, a repetitive feature of the economic policies of the current Government. Ireland is once again the sick man of Europe. Our economy will shrink by at least 5% this year. With an unprecedented 36,500 people signing on the dole in January, double the previous record, the Taoiseach has admitted that the live register will rise to at least 400,000 by Christmas, twice the level of when he took office.

Low and middle level public servants, small businesses and PAYE workers are now bearing the brunt of the problems created by huge failures on the part of Government politicians, some bankers, some business leaders and regulators.

The root of Ireland's unique difficulties is the cronyism of Fianna Fáil over the years. The economic principles that delivered the prosperity of the Celtic tiger under Fine Gael in the 1990s — keeping costs down through competition, high productivity, export-led growth, tight budgeting and strong regulation of the financial sector and housing market — were all abandoned by corrupt Fianna Fáil-led Governments since 1997. Instead, the wealth generating power of the private sector and the public service mission of the State were bent by Fianna Fáil to serve the interests of a new golden circle of banks, property developers, big businesses, senior public servants and regulators.

Instead of continuously harassing the Opposition for lack of co-operation with a scheme designed to penalise those least able to pay, the Taoiseach and his Government would have been better advised to seek the co-operation of Opposition parties for a revised levy designed to save €1 billion and aimed at those earning in excess of, say, €100,000 and then look to the main Opposition parties for ideas on how to save the other €1 billion without driving low paid workers on to the dole and out of their homes. Irrespective of whether the Taoiseach wants to admit it, proposals by Fine Gael to make the necessary savings through such measures as a pay, increment and bonus freezes in the public sector and pay cuts for those earning €100,000 plus, the overhaul of FÁS operations, efficiency reviews and bureaucratic streamlining would be an effective means of achieving what the Government has lumped into inequitable penalties on those least able to cope or bear the brunt.

In the past few months, the Taoiseach has perfected the art of talking the talk without saying anything. His Government has wasted valuable time and money talking around the issue of recession without delivering solutions. For the Taoiseach to expect low and middle earners to once again bear the brunt of cutbacks is unfair and untenable. What does it take to make him realise that the loss of €450 to an already hard pressed worker on €15,000 is far more crippling than the €28,750 annual levy for those on a salary of €300,000 and more. It is extremely puzzling to low paid workers that judges are exempt from the levy. I hope the Taoiseach can give a reasonable explanation as to why that is the case.

Fine Gael has consistently called for the reform of the public service, which is imperative and vital to the national interest. Public service reform is not a criticism of the Civil Service. Our public service has a fine tradition of dedication and makes a major contribution to the economic and social life of Ireland. We must improve structures to make it more citizen-centred in the delivery of services and in the provision of essential infrastructure. The public must be given an input into policy-making to ensure services are designed and delivered to meet the highest standards, greater knowledge of services and to ensure access to them with greater ease. This would attract the confidence of our citizens in the system.

It is also important to improve technologies to help in the delivery of services, to provide better value for money and greater efficiencies. There is nothing wrong with radical reform and transformation of the Civil Service to bring a system, which we essentially inherited and utilised since the foundation of the State, up to 21st century standards.

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