Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The audacity of the Government never ceases to amaze me. These are the people who introduced funny mathematics into Irish politics, with the idea that cutting a few top wages would save billions. Sinn Féin is very modest with its proposal for a few hundred million euros. When Fine Gael, and particularly the Labour Party, were in opposition, they used to come in with savings that amounted to €1 million or €500,000 and the savings were going to solve the whole economic problem. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery and Sinn Féin has certainly learnt lessons from funny mathematics. Members of the Opposition remember the €4 billion in savings that the Minister for Health, Deputy Reilly, was going to find in the health budget by eliminating waste. I wished I had a one-on-one opportunity to give him the Estimate and ask him to put his finger on the savings.

I do not think the Government understands that the public service has rejected the deal. If there were threats, they came from the Government to get the deal through to the effect that legislation would be introduced to force through the deal. That would have caused industrial chaos and I am glad the Government had the common sense to realise it must listen to people when its ideas were rejected and that it must work another way.

With a budget of €50 billion, I could never understand how the Government got itself into this situation. The Minister of State said the Croke Park agreement was a good and ground-breaking deal. We were getting major reform in the public service and I have seen how some public servants have worked in a fantastic way to make changes and savings. Some are better than others. The Croke Park agreement was due to run until the end of the year. When governments enter into agreements, even if a new government comes in, the tradition is to honour the agreement of the old government. Otherwise, it is impossible for anyone to do business with any government. Inevitably, the cycle of agreements of all types straddles different governments. I cannot understand why the Government rushed the fence and created an arbitrary €300 million figure that it must find from one source, the wages of public servants, rather than seeing out the Croke Park agreement and beginning negotiations at this time, allowing plenty of time to develop a successor agreement. In industrial relations, one needs trust. How can one trust a government that could not see out an agreement entered into in good faith by the trade union movement?

As the Minister of State pointed out, the success we have had in cutting the cost of the public service wage bill is testament to the fact that Croke Park I was a very good and a very fair deal.

The second issue with which I would like to deal is the unreality of going to public servants, many of whom are between the ages of 30 and 50, and, in particular, to front-line workers who are even more concentrated between those ages because of the lack of recruitment in recent years and because of the nature of the jobs they do. For example, gardaí, who normally retire after 30 years, are in the 30 to 50 age group. We all know people in that age group have mortgages, face financial pressures and are trying to rear families but they do not have enough money. We also know that in many cases during the boom, the public service wage in a household was the subsidiary wage and mortgages and commitments were taken on based on two wages, of which it was the smaller. We now know that in many cases, that wage is the primary one and that, combined with the wage cuts in the public service, loss of overtime and loss of other benefits, it has put an intolerable burden on families.

The Government wonders why the agreement was rejected. Let us be honest about it. If one is between 55 or 60 years of age, one's mortgage is paid and one's family is grown up and educated. Of course, one can take a wage cut, although one might have to tighten one's belt a bit but it is all doable and sustainable. Many people in the public service are in a totally different financial situation from others. However, because this Government has been singularly anti-family in its budgets, the middle group, in particular, has reached the point that it has told the Government quite clearly that it cannot take any more. This year the Government hit it with child benefit cuts, property tax, a PRSI increase and car tax. That is hitting families which, in many cases, have mortgages that are disproportionate to the salaries they have.

If the Minister wants to go back to public servants again, he should deal with the mortgage issue and not by saying 95,000 people can reach personal arrangements which will mean they will have to account for their personal circumstances in a way that somebody even in receipt of jobseeker's allowance would not have to. At least if one gets jobseeker's allowance, one gets the money and nobody checks whether one has a Sky package. It is time we started to understand the situation ordinary people are in.

Why will the Government not raise taxes for those earning more than €100,000, many of whom are in the private sector? Why was there such a paltry cut comparatively to salaries of more than €100,000? I have done the mathematics on this and I used to point it out when in government but those opposite did not want to listen. It would not raise a huge amount of money but it would be symbolically important and people would understand that those who can pay most will do so.

People are at breaking point and are very disillusioned that this Government seems to be oblivious to the problems faced by ordinary, decent and hardworking families. Will the Government pause and deal with the mortgage issue first and not by keeping a record of expenses of ordinary families trying to rear children, who are our future? When that is done, let us go back to the table at the end of this year and honour an agreement entered into by Government and workers in good faith. Then the Government might make some progress and get people to listen.

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