Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Last year in preparation for the budget for 2012, as soon as the Dáil came back in September every week there was a rash of speculation about what would be cut, which certainly had a direct impact on consumer confidence and retail because people quite rightly decided to hold tight because they did not know what was going to happen. This year the budget was discussed and approved collectively by the Cabinet. It is a requirement that it be signed off by the Cabinet. The preparation for this was not just conducted by the Economic Management Council. Individual face to face and bilateral meetings were held between the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform and each Minister on the ceiling for each Department and proposals for savings, and all of these were signed off at bilateral level. It came through the Economic Management Council and then on to the Government.

This year there was not the same level of public comment, except I noticed wild speculation that the old age pension would be cut, free travel and free light would be stopped, the period for free fuel would be shortened and the allowance would be stopped, and carers allowance and the home care package would be cut. There were also extraordinary remarks about the scale of the property tax and that it would run to thousands of euro. The same speculation was made in comments about the requirement to deal with pollution from septic tanks in various parts of the country and the extraordinary amount this would cost. Obviously these were very different in reality.

The year 1994 was a very different space. We have had the obscenity of several Governments in between shovelling out mountains of money which did not belong to us and which somebody would have to pay back.

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