Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

There are now 437,079 people on the live register. The number of people on it in December was the highest end of year figure since records began and was the 19th successive month that the number of people on it was over 400,000. People who are fortunate enough to have a job are finding that their pay has been cut through the taxes that were introduced in the budget and the universal social charge. People who are paid weekly or fortnightly have already had that experience and those who are paid monthly will see the changes later in the month.

People who are out of work and on the lowest levels of social welfare are being asked to survive on even less. Families are being told that their VHI premia will increase, in some cases by as much as 43%. Many other families are struggling to pay mortgages and in some cases are facing repossession. While all of that is taking place the Government is preoccupied with its own survival. The Green Party announced it was withdrawing from Government and that we would have an election by the end of January but the situation seems to have changed.

A number of Ministers said they are not contesting the next election. A leadership issue is to be decided in Fianna Fáil. We have a dysfunctional Government. Its dysfunctionality has been demonstrated clearly in the fact that when President Sarkozy last week publicly launched an assault on this country's rate of corporation tax, I saw no Minister or anybody in Government publicly responding. Nobody is minding the shop while Fianna Fáil is trying to sort out its internal difficulties.

Last week I asked the Taoiseach a number of times to set out a clear timetable for the taking of the finance Bill and the dissolution of the Dáil to give the people of the country an opportunity to decide who should be governing the country and get the fresh start and change the country needs. Can the Taoiseach tell us today what the timetable is or will he provide time in the House to debate the motion of no confidence in the Government tabled by the Labour Party?

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