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

While I do not propose to support this legislation, it is not because I do not respect the decision of the electorate in the referendum on the fiscal treaty. I accept that decision. Nevertheless, a substantial proportion of voters opposed the proposal and it is right and proper that I and others who took the same position should represent that view when it comes to the vote on this Bill. The Government is committed to the proposal and its majority in the Chamber means it will be passed. However, this debate affords an important opportunity to take stock, as Deputy Kieran O'Donnell and others have done, of where we are at. The strategy that has been pursued in recent years is now effectively enshrined and institutionalised in the fiscal treaty, which means we are locked into a particular strategy for dealing with the financial and economic crisis for up to a decade, irrespective of whether that strategy is working or not. Nevertheless, it is important to reassess its effectiveness thus far. Any fair and objective analysis of the current situation would have to conclude that the chickens are coming home to roost in regard to the austerity agenda generally and the specific model that is locked into the fiscal treaty.

All of the claims made in the referendum campaign by the "Yes" side were found by the electorate to be plausible and people voted in favour of the treaty. They now lie in tatters. The Taoiseach sold the treaty on the basis that it would "create stability in the euro zone that is essential for growth and job creation." He added that a strong "Yes" vote would create the certainty and stability "our country needs to continue on the road to economic recovery." The International Monetary Fund has finally cottoned on that this is nonsense. Despite pushing the treaty and being the architect of austerity, the IMF has admitted it was wrong and austerity is not working. The fiscal council, in its latest quarterly report, has admitted it was wrong and that the effects of austerity and trying to cut our way out of a recession have been much more damaging, devastating and destructive of the prospects for economic growth than it suspected. Consequently, all its growth forecasts are being downgraded as they are no longer reliable.

The IMF went further by stating that austerity has been more damaging, euro for euro, than the money that was taken from the economy in the austerity measures - in other words, there has been a negative multiplier in terms of the economic damage that has been done by trying to cut our way out of a recession. Under the fiscal treaty we are required to take such an approach for years in an effort to deal with the economic crisis. This policy is not working. On every indicator, the position is as bad or worse than it was when austerity commenced. At a human level, unemployment is as bad as ever and shows no signs of reducing. There are 35,000 fewer jobs in the economy this year than there were last year. In addition, the unemployment rate would be even more disastrous were it not for the emigration of 40,000 people each year.

The position is serious and deteriorating. There is no sign of light on the horizon. Small firms continue to go out of business and all the talk of small and medium enterprise being the engine of the economy is not being translated into concrete measures to relieve the pressure on this sector. As a result, companies are going out of business daily. Nothing is happening because the economic demand small and medium sized businesses require to thrive is absent. Every time we cut the incomes of ordinary people, demand collapses further and more small and medium firms go out of business. The sector is also being crushed by high rates and parking charges as well as-----

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