Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

Like other speakers, I thank the proposing party, Sinn Féin, for bringing forward this motion and affording us the opportunity to speak in support of it.

One must look back at the history of the child benefit payment, the children's allowance as we know it. In the previous Government's time in office, from 2000 to 2009, it was raised by 330%. When we spoke about this issue and others relating to the social protection brief some weeks ago, those Governments were accused of being populist and of electioneering and so forth. As I stated then, I repeat now: that is the purpose of politics in its republican ethos in that when one has it, one distributes it. One tries to help those who are in most need and one tries to put services and programmes in place in order to help and protect the most vulnerable. There has been in this entire child protection area investment in child care and resource centres, in preschool places and in the school education system itself.

In recent times, especially in recent months, there is a new cohort which is dependant on various forms of social welfare payment. That was nowhere more evident than in the back-to-school allowance scheme. Massive numbers applied for that scheme this year and there are still some cases today being processed and awarded. I appreciate the difficulty the Department encountered in this regard and the efforts the Minister made to deal with them in so much as her Department could, based on the constraints of personnel and so forth. That, in itself, would make plain for all to see that the universal child protection payment system was never more needed than it is now. This new cohort has so many constraints and difficulties to deal with. Many of them never thought they would find themselves in that situation based on their position with work, with mortgages on their homes and with the cost of education, and the threat of being faced with more hikes in the case of the latter.

That same Government took no pleasure in the past number of years in taking almost €21 billion out of the public finances, including a 4% cut in social welfare rates across the board this time last year. That included cuts in child benefit payments. That was done in the face of an oncoming election. We most certainly could not have been accused at that time of being populist or of electioneering.

That election, many would argue, did not need the kind of rhetoric that was prevalent, especially in the final week of the campaign. When the budget was put before the Dáil last year, it was vehemently opposed by all sides other than that of the Government, but one party promised to overturn those cuts. One party then, on entering Government, promised to maintain welfare rates. One party stated in the last week of the election campaign that child benefit was a red-line issue. It was stated that Fine Gael needed to drop its stance on child benefit before the Labour Party would even begin to consult with it about the possibility of forming a Government.

The Labour Party stated that cuts in child benefit were savage. It voted against the Finance Bill and against the four year plan. Yet, many members of this Government are happy to take the plaudits of international commentators and of European partners when they are congratulated for the manner in which they have tackled the public finances and closed the gap between what we spend and what we take in.

During that election, there was much deliberation and engagement among the candidates and the public. Many of the parties made no grandiose promises and many of the candidates who voiced that opinion with those at the door were commended for their stance in that regard. In my own case, it had to be said that the gap had to continue to be closed, there was no magic fix, there was no silver bullet and we had to continue to wrestle with that prospect.

In the meantime, we have seen the interest rate applicable to the bailout funds that we have drawn down reduced. Many would argue this was by accident rather than design by virtue of the contagion that spread and so forth, but that is neither here nor there. We are in a slightly different place than we were. On the manner in which banks are capitalised, our partners in Europe have come up with a mechanism by which that can be done, contrary to the one to which the Government of which my party was a member had to adhere back then.

The Government is faced with the prospect of closing the gap between expenditure and income in this year's budget by approximately €3.8 billion. My party agrees. I believe all parties, even the Sinn Féin Party, agree with those figures but the problem may lie in the fact that the Government predicates the figure on the basis of growth next year of approximately 1.6% or 1.8%. The ESRI states that the growth rate will be somewhat less than that. The position in Europe and in the eurozone indicates further recession in many countries and that puts in grave jeopardy any predictions of that nature, despite the success of our innovators and exporters. That would mean that the task the Government envisages next year will be even greater than the one before it this year. If that is the case I shudder to think, if the past few weeks are anything to go by, where we will be halfway through next year, when the Government begins to fly kites about what is expected then because there were so many of them in the air in the past few weeks that air traffic control was having difficulty guiding planes into this country. It may be that this is merely a cynical exercise in order to appease some backbenchers.

We, as a party, do not propose to oppose for the sake of opposition. As I stated, I acknowledge we are committed to the same targets but we must seek to broaden the tax base and not to allow a narrow dependency in the future. To remain with such a narrow focus may allow us to become unstuck, and maybe that is where the Government finds itself.

The Government has committed to no increase in taxes and to no decrease in welfare rates, yet the Minister states the Government can meet the targets. The watering down of that commitment by some Government members over the past number of weeks is worrying, for instance, when one hears a Deputy state that the Government is committed to primary rates. When I and, I am sure, other Deputies meet people at clinics and on the streets and elsewhere, they tell us they are finding it difficult to survive. When they are dependent on social welfare income of any kind or combination, they do not know the difference between primary and secondary payments. Children especially do not know the difference between primary and secondary payments. They must be protected at all costs, as must the elderly.

Is it not strange to think we are talking about this issue and the threat and worries for families in fear for those funds that come into the house dedicated solely towards children's rights and welfare while, allied to that, community care nursing homes are threatened with closure throughout the country? Is that a measure of where we are before the budget?

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