Olivia Mitchell (Dublin South, Fine Gael)

I do not think it will have any impact whatsoever.

Before the budget, there was widespread agreement that €4 billion needed to be taken out of the economy. There was recognition that the quantum of money was important. However, how the cuts were to be made was equally important. Where would the spending cuts be made? What priorities were to be established? What incentives or disincentives would be put in place or removed? They are important for two reasons. First, we had to establish that whatever the Government was to do, it would be fair - otherwise, it would not gain acceptance among the public, of whom we are asking quite a lot - and, second, cuts and spending decisions must be targeted in such a way that they are counter-cyclical. That is the big flaw in the budget. Ideally, the budget should change economic behaviour so that at the end of next year, when we face another budget, we will not face even more difficult choices. The Government's actions have simply reinforced the cycle of economic decline, making even more drastic cuts necessary next year. That is my major criticism of the budget: we are asking people to take all this pain for virtually no gain.

Cutting social welfare for able-bodied people of working age may change economic behaviour by making people more anxious to look for work or willing to take work they would not otherwise have considered. However, cutting benefits for carers and blind and disabled people will not change their behaviour. After the cuts they will still be blind or disabled or carers. All the Government has achieved is to make life much more difficult for them. We have asked them to take a disproportionate share of the burden. It is not just the loss of €8.50 a week; they are also facing other cuts. They are bearing a disproportionate burden compared to the able-bodied, particularly in the area of health. The increase in the excess on drug payments, the introduction of prescription charges and the reduction with regard to dental treatment will all fall more heavily on this sector.

Since the recession began, we have all denied responsibility for it. Nobody has put their hands up - not the bankers, not the Government. Everybody else is to blame except ourselves. However, it has never been suggested that the blind, the disabled or carers had anything to do with what was visited upon us. We all, to some extent, see ourselves as victims, but I do not think anyone would deny that these people are utterly blameless victims and should not have to suffer a disproportionate share of the cuts.

Cuts have to be made, but the Government can make choices about where they are to be made. There are two areas in particular in which they should have been made. For months before the budget was introduced - even before the McCarthy report came out, but mostly after it came out - the media, the newspapers and the politicians in the pubs were worrying about where the cuts would fall. What quangos would be abolished, what administration would be streamlined, what bureaucracies would be got rid of? It turned out to be none. None at all. It was all a distraction - a trifle to keep us amused while the Government got on with what it was going to do anyway. It was merely softening up public opinion. In fact, the Government had no intention of making any of those changes.

Ultimately, it is business as usual. We still have major waste and outdated programmes and processes. To sustain that kind of spending into the future, we are cutting benefits to the most dependent. Most reprehensible of all is that the Government did nothing to reduce the actual numbers on social welfare. In fact, it planned for an increase in the number drawing social welfare benefits. Of course, that number can only grow in the absence of a jobs stimulus package, which should have been at the heart of this budget. Only economic growth can take us out of this hole and stem the tide of unemployment and emigration. Only economic growth will ensure that we can continue to support carers and blind and disabled people. However, there is nothing in this budget that will achieve that. All we have done is to reinforce the downward cycle and ensure that the contraction in the economy will be even greater next year.

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