Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)

Deputy O'Dea is simply wrong. The Government did not increase any of the employment related costs, neither income tax nor PRSI. In fact, it reduced PRSI and took people out of the universal social charge. We actually reduced the costs on employment directly in the last budget.

It was the previous Administration that did what the Deputy has just claimed. Action is being taken against constrained resource time. It is not true that wage costs are focused on the lower paid. The unit wage cost improvement of 20% is on the aggregate of wages across all scales.

See this speech in context