Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

I thank the Acting Chairman for his protection.

Public servants realise the country is in a hole and what caused the massive deterioration in the public finances. Despite the Minister's earlier promises to address the anomalies in the Bill, his amendments are purely technical in nature. The first anomaly is that low-paid public servants will have to pay the levy. The second serious anomaly is that the levy will be applied to all reckonable income, including income which is not reckonable for pension purposes. Public servants will pay the levy on all income, even though much of it may not be reckonable for pension purposes. In that sense, it is not really a pension levy but an income levy, an additional tax. The third anomaly which the Minister promised to review but did not address in his concluding speech on Second Stage is that a public servant earning €30,000 will actually pay more after tax than someone earning €50,000. The Minister brushed this aside by claiming it was a function of the way the tax bands operated and a matter addressed by taxation. That is not good enough.

There are serious issues concerning equity and how the levy is structured. One mechanism for addressing this would be through a sunset clause, whereby the Bill would be withdrawn after two years or, if the Government wished to reinstate it, it would be subject to a resolution of both Houses. As a parliamentary device, that would make sense because this is rushed legislation. As all Members are aware, rushed legislation is oftentimes bad legislation. I presume that some of the anomalies contained in the Bill inevitably will be subject to challenge, possibly in the courts.

It is important that there should be a mechanism for reviewing the legislation on a regular basis. Government Ministers, particularly those who represent Fianna Fáil, have referred in recent days to everyone working together. They even suggested — probably more so to Fine Gael rather than the Labour Party — the concept of a national Government. However, there continues to be an arrogance in the context of the intellectual response. There is a suggestion that the Opposition should not suggest any amendments because those in power are not listening. If we are serious with regard to everyone in the country working together, it must be remembered that those in opposition seek to be every bit as conscientious in respect of their patriotic duty as are those on the Government benches. However, it is very difficult to be patriotic when one is presented with Bills such as that before the House which contain profoundly unfair anomalies.

The fourth matter that arises in the context of the Bill relates to when, if ever, the pension levy will be removed. In an extraordinary interview on RTE radio this morning, the Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Deputy Coughlan, spoke at great length about how, in her belief, our economic difficulties have largely been solved. That is what I heard the woman say. If that is so, why not include a sunset clause in the Bill? Last weekend's Sunday Independent contained another extraordinary and long interview with the Tánaiste. It is obvious that she is considering what the Government has done. In the interview to which I refer, the Tánaiste, when commenting on Government policy relating to the budget, stated: "The six-point differential was mad, the big psychology of it was that everybody went across the border to shop, which was a total disaster." She further stated: "...for my own area, on the border, the VAT has been a nightmare." Therefore, the second most senior officeholder in Government is basically saying that a key element of the Government's budget strategy "was mad".

See this speech in context