Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

No, the Minister of State is trying to claim that cutting the wages of low-paid part-time contract workers is a great advance. I do not know in what economy he lives and do not know whether he has heard of the concept of economic stimulus that appears to be in fashion with everyone else in the world. However, the budget presented by the Minister for Finance is highly deflationary, as is cutting the income of the lowest-paid people in society. As the Minister of State may remember, people on very low incomes spend most of their money into the local economy and, therefore, are valuable to local shops.

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