Jerry Buttimer (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I commend the budget. After years of difficult and prudent decisions it helps to relaunch the next phase of our country’s recovery. None of us on this side of the House is complacent. The model promulgated by Deputy Boyd Barrett - I am sorry he is not here - is one of spend, spend, spend. We need to be prudent in our economic management, create jobs, and get more people back to work. Over the past six years every household and family in the country has been affected. The sacrifice the people have made has helped bring us to the point where we have a non-austerity budget.

As Deputy Eoghan Murphy said, we have for too long allowed a certain few to participate in the delivery of a budget. I support the reform of that process. We need an independent budgetary office and more oversight of how the budget is presented and to find ways in which we as Members of the Parliament can participate by having our ideas and suggestions costed, probed and analysed. I fully support Deputy Eoghan Murphy in that regard.

This budget is the result of a collaborative effort on the part of the Irish people and a Government that could steer a ship and be strong in its course of action. It is important that people feel the economic benefits. Growth of 4% means nothing to the person at home. A reduction in unemployment to 11% means 70,000 jobs have been created and those people are back at work. This budget contains measures that will put people back to work and assist those who rely on social protection payments.

Members opposite are peddling a narrative that this is a budget for the rich. Let us dispel that notion: the taxation measures contained in this budget are progressive. It has prioritised those on low and middle incomes by taking 80,000 on low incomes out of the universal social charge, USC, net and increasing the income level at which the top rate of tax is paid. Since coming into office this Government has relieved more than 400,000 people of having to pay USC. This is the first year of a three year reform package to reduce the tax burden and which will have at its core the tenets of fairness, job creation and economic growth. We have heard nothing but misinformation from the Opposition about the fairness of this budget. Low-paid workers were prioritised. The tax bill of a PAYE worker earning €25,000 a year will be cut by 4.6% whereas tax on a person earning €70,000 will be cut by just 2.9%. After this budget 80% of the taxes of the nation will be paid by the top 24% of earners, a fact not acknowledged by the prophets of doom and gloom opposite. Under Fianna Fáil someone earning €12,000 a year would pay €160 in USC. Under this Government the same person will pay no income tax, yet we do not hear that from Fianna Fáil.

This budget has provided much relief for people on fixed incomes and contains measures which help those who rely solely on social welfare payments. I very much welcome the return of the Christmas bonus of 25% on the weekly payment and the new water subsidy of €100 per annum for all those on the household package or fuel allowance. The budget helps families by increasing child benefit by €5 per month. Working families will be helped to pay water charges by a tax deductible allowance up to €500 per annum at the standard rate. I would like to see reform in the cost of childcare and the payment of child benefit and would very much like to see a White Paper of some description and a conversation on the cost of childcare.

After the damage caused by Fianna Fáil, which was in Government for 12 of the past 17 years, our sovereignty has been restored, having been betrayed by Fianna Fáil when it forced us into an EU-IMF bailout. Returning the country to a position of growth, employment, prudent economic management and fairness has been the hallmark of this Government.

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