Willie O'Dea (Limerick City, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Tánaiste for his clarification. The parents of middle Ireland, who are extremely worried about the contents of the report, can breathe a little easier now. I take it from the Tánaiste's reply that there is no immediate intention to implement the report. The Government has not made a decision on the matter yet. Is that not what the Tánaiste said? No decision has been taken on whether the Government supports the recommendations in the report.

The report itself states that the impact of a two-tier system on poverty would be marginal. It goes on to concede that the people who would be hardest hit would be income earners in middle Ireland. It also concedes that the effects on employment incentives would be mixed, at best. It is hardly worth the political trouble and social dislocation of hitting middle Ireland, the squeezed middle, once more to bring about results which the writers of the report concede would be, at best, marginal.

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