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

Many of them maintained a landline so they can have an alarm system for the sake of their security and safety. Despite protestations to the contrary, many people found that only by maintaining the landline system and paying the rental can they have a sense of security. It is important to elderly people, particularly those who feel isolated and vulnerable. There was a major push before the budget for a reversal of the €110 million taken from the allowance over the past number of budgets but no response.

Detailed submissions were made by the Carers Association. Carers contribute €70 million per week in unpaid work. If the State had to pay the bill, the 3% deficit target would be far out of sight. The Carers Association looked for a partial restoration of the respite care grant. The respite care grant is paid to people working as carers 24-7, often at the expense of their health. I know many carers whose health has been impaired by their onerous duties. The respite care grant was not a bonus, sweetener or incentive but a payment to enable those people to get away for a short time from their onerous duties and it was slashed. When making representations, the Carers Association asked for a partial restoration and a few extra days away. God knows they have onerous duties working seven days a week, 24 hours a day, but there was no response from the Government.

When the Tánaiste reduced the unemployment assistance payments to young jobseekers, she did so on the spurious basis that it would be character building, that there were plenty opportunities and that these people had to be encouraged to take up these opportunities in employment, education or training. Despite that, some 74,000 young people are not in employment, education or training. Why are they enduring these penurious rates of social assistance if places are not available? It is not the case that they are not in employment, education or training by choice; the vast majority are not in those activities because there are no places.

I welcome the announcement in the Tánaiste's speech that she will partially recognise the arguments we make on the Opposition side. The last Government must also bear some responsibility for this. The income lone parents can earn without the allowance being reduced is decreasing. The age of the child under which one can receive lone parents' allowance is being reduced gradually to seven years. People who do not qualify, because they do not have a child under the requisite age, go on jobseeker's allowance at which point it is much harder to go to work because of the means test and the three-day rule. It is extraordinary that this is presented as an activation measure or an incentive to people yet the only people affected by the twin changes are lone parents who work. They are the only ones who lose out. Jobseeker's allowance is €188 per week for those over 26 years of age. The lone parent's rate is the same so the only people affected are lone parents who go to work. It seems to be based on the extraordinary proposition that the less people gain by working, the more likely one is to work.

People with disabilities made representations and came to see us on a number of occasions. The reaction to the budget was summed up by the spokesperson, Mr. Dolan, who said it completely "fails to meet people with disabilities’ ambition to live in the community with dignity and independence".

Maternity benefits has been cut and there is no restoration of it. People who qualify for the clothing and footwear allowance have had €43.2 million gouged from their payments by the Government. These are the poorest of the poor and it takes €43.3 million from the pockets of people who must be virtually destitute to pass the means test to qualify for the clothing and footwear allowance. In last year's budget, the Government announced people must provide for themselves for six days rather than three days if they are sick. This takes €22 million away from the sick. In most cases, the employer will not pay. The Government has made it more difficult to qualify for the disability allowance at a cost of €46.6 million to people on disability allowance. I do not have time to elaborate on the changes made to the farm assist scheme, to the disadvantage of recipients, the abolition of the statutory redundancy schemes, increases in minimum rent contributions for rent allowance or cuts to the exceptional needs payments. The latter was designed to help people who are virtually destitute. There is also the abolition of the PRSI allowance and prescription charges, a tax on medical card holders, cuts to medical home help hours of 600,000 hours, the gradual erosion of the voluntary and community sector, property taxes, water charges, carbon taxes, etc.

The Tánaiste has trumpeted the improvement resulting from the €196 million expenditure and one is the increase in the living alone allowance from €7.90 to €9 per week. That is a grand annual total of €67, or 20 cent per day. I do not know of any retail establishment in this country where people can buy a lollipop for 20 cent. Child benefit has given an extra hour of child care per month per child.

In its previous two budgets, the Government took approximately €213 million out of the allocation in respect of the child care. On foot of the recent budget, €72 million of this will be restored.

The back to work dividend scheme, much vaunted though it has been, seems a very insipid response to the problem of poverty traps and to the question of encouraging people - or making it worth their while or affordable for them - to go out to work. There are alterations which could be made to the social welfare system. I refer, for example, to dealing with the three-day rule relating to jobseeker's allowance or introducing a number of small changes to the family income supplement, FIS, system. Such steps could make an enormous difference. There is also the lack of refundable tax credits to consider. I could go on but I will not do so. No real attempt has been made to deal with any of these matters. What we have been presented with is, as far as I can see, a fairly minor proposal that will certainly not compensate in any way for the cost of child care incurred by someone who goes out to work. If one goes out to work and one has children, then one must obviously make arrangements for child care. However, we will not see what is proposed in this regard until some time next year.

I have no objection to an increase in the Christmas bonus. If there is money available to the Labour Tánaiste and Minister for Social Protection to increase the Christmas bonus by 25% in order to give everybody a few cent, would it not be much better if she used €27 million of the money involved to restore the respite care grant and the remainder to reverse - to some extent - the cuts to the free ESB allowance? The latter would have a real impact but the difficulty is that only a certain number of people or a particular sector of society would benefit. The Government must appeal to the majority of voters and it is giving them all a few cent as a result. Its action in this regard is tokenistic.

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