Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)

The Taoiseach committed in the programme for Government to protecting the vulnerable and to burden sharing on an equitable basis. The programme also placed a big priority on job creation. Yesterday in Athlone, a man who worked for 30 years in a small business but who recently lost the business challenged the Taoiseach about the Government's policies, and was told by the Taoiseach that "You could do with a day's work". That is a very demeaning and insulting comment to a man who had worked very hard for 30 years. Aside from the need to apologise to Mr. Gordon Hudson for that dreadful comment, does this indicate a new shift in policy from that outlined in the programme for Government? Is the new policy now contempt for people without work and contempt for people who have worked all their lives and who tried to contribute to our society? What about the glib comment on emigration that we heard earlier today? Tens of thousands of our young people are being forced out of the country as they cannot find work here, because the Government has failed to deliver on its promises to get the country working. The Taoiseach now simply describes that as a fact of life, when in fact it is a fact of politics and economics and the disastrous policies of austerity.

Is it the new stance of the Government to be contemptuous of people like Gordon Hudson, contemptuous of the people who are forced out of the country, contemptuous of the fact that one in three young people in this country is without work? Is that just a fact of life? Does the Taoiseach feel any responsibility whatsoever to update the programme to deliver on his party's campaign slogan to get the country working and the programme for Government slogan to protect the vulnerable and burden sharing on an equitable basis?

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