Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)

The Taoiseach, when asked again and again in May and June about this issue, dodged the questions and hid the truth. It took the Freedom of Information Act to for us to uncover that the Government received and ignored repeated warnings about the damage this levy could do. The Taoiseach hid that information from the House. I sought this information in May and June and the Taoiseach refused to provide it.

Before the Taoiseach repeats his standard line minimising the impact of this levy, he should consider the following. One member of the group with whom I met today is drawing a pension of €10,000 per annum. The effect of the pensions levy, and the Government's insistence, through legislation, that the pensioner pays, on this individual is not 0.6% as trumpeted by the Taoiseach but 10%. This man's income falls from €10,000 per annum to €9,000 per annum for the next four years. This is just the start of it. At least 70,000 other private pension holders in this country will feel the full impact of the levy from 25 September onwards and that is just the first tranche.

For the purposes of political gimmickry, the Taoiseach ignored the advice of qualified experts in the Departments of Finance and Social Protection. The Minister for Finance and the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform were warned that this levy was coming at the worst possible time as employers and employees do not have the resources to make additional contributions. The result since its introduction has been no new jobs and more people on the live register.

It is clear the Taoiseach withheld crucial information about the danger of the levy when he pushed it through the House. It has become increasingly clear that the initiative was less about creating jobs and more about the image-building that characterised his early days in Government. Will the Taoiseach acknowledge that the impact of this levy on the 70,000 people, at a minimum, who will be hit by it at the end of the month will be significantly more damaging than he admitted at the time of its introduction?

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