Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I include in those figures the water rates bills that are due next year. They must be taken into account. On budget day the Minister made it very clear that water rates are separate from budgetary measures, but one person gave the lie to that statement by the Minister for Finance, namely, the Taoiseach. At an annual Fine Gael event he inextricably linked tax rates and water rates. He made it very clear that if water rates are not introduced, there will be a 4% increase in the tax rate. He made the situation abundantly clear, more so than any commentator in this House or elsewhere could have done. The point we made on budget day is that one cannot look separately at the budget and other Government charges. The Taoiseach confirmed that in his own statement. He said it on the national airwaves. He inextricably linked water rates and income tax rates. The water rates bill is part of the legislation. There is a reference to the issue in the explanatory memorandum of the Social Welfare Bill even though it does not appear in the legislation.

The answer to the question of whether this is good or bad legislation is very simple. It is legislation to look after the wealthy. All the budgets produced by the Government since 2012 were regressive. All objective analysts have confirmed that. Someone cajoled the ESRI recently into producing a report showing that the combined effects of budgets from 2008 to 2012 were progressive overall. The reason for that is very simple. Difficult and all as the budgets were in 2008, 2009 and 2010, when the most difficult cuts were being made, those on the lowest income levels were looked after the best and the budgets were progressive. Ever since the Government came to power the budgets have been regressive. If one adds the budgets introduced by the Fianna Fáil-led Governments to the first two budgets introduced by the Government, the overall effect was positive because of the carry-over of the progressive budgets.

One could ask what we should have done with the available resources. This is the first time we had resources available and the Government made choices. Although key issues arise in the areas of health, homelessness and housing, the Government decided to give tax cuts to high income earners. That was the answer to everything.

I was in Naas General Hospital yesterday visiting a patient and all of the nursing staff were out on the picket line at lunchtime.

It is a shame that I was coming in here on the same day when people were suffering in accident and emergency units and the Government's answer has been to give tax cuts to the wealthy. Last Thursday I was in the same hospital. It was not possible to get in the door of the accident and emergency unit in Naas General Hospital because the beds were end to end on both sides of the corridor, causing a fire hazard as well as a health and safety hazard. How staff and patients are expected to cope in such a hospital which lacks the physical facilities to allow staff to carry out their duties is beyond comprehension. It is only right that the nurses and staff were on a picket line at lunchtime today and yesterday on that issue. For these reasons we must oppose everything to do with this budget, the main aim of which was to give tax cuts to the high earners and penalise and make worse off those with incomes of less than €800 a week.

I acknowledged that some sections of this Bill and the Finance Bill may be good and are welcome. Overall, it is a camouflage and a fig leaf for a bad budget. For that reason we must oppose the entire Bill.

The Bill provides for an increase of €5 a month in child benefit, which is welcome. However, when one considers the cuts introduced by the Minister, who is now the Tánaiste, in this area since she came into office, this is a paltry increase. I accept it is a start but it is a small start and I remind the House of the cuts she inflicted as part of the regressive budgets over which she presided in recent years.

Many of the announcements in the Budget Statement are not included in this legislation. For example, the increase in the living alone allowance will be introduced by regulation, as will the Christmas bonus. These issues should be debated on the floor of the House and not by way of reading a statutory instrument in the Oireachtas Library.

One of the issues announced on budget day which is not included in this legislation is a measure I put forward in the Fianna Fáil pre-budget submission. I am delighted the Government followed through and did precisely what we asked with regard to the back-to-work family dividend. I see every day in my constituency clinic where people on social welfare who are in receipt of €29.80 for each dependent child lose that payment if they return to work. It is wrong that a person with three dependent children who takes a job is down by €100. Fianna Fáil's submission proposed the continuation of the full child dependant allowance for at least a year or two years when a person takes up work. We now see that this measure is not included in this legislation and we are told it will come into force some time next year by means of separate legislation. The text of the Finance Bill is 124 pages and this Bill is contained on one page. It would have been possible to draft the legislation to include the back-to-work family dividend. It should be included in this Bill and it should be in force from 1 January 2015. I do not know if the Minister will even be on that side of the House next spring or next summer. Good measures which we suggested to encourage people back to work should be included in this legislation and not put on the long finger. This is a further reason I will oppose this legislation because items that should be included have been specifically omitted. The back-to-work family dividend should be included in this legislation and it should be law on 1 January 2015. The Department of Finance can do it with regard to tax changes.

I refer to other budget day announcements which are non-statutory items which may mean administrative items. The public do not understand this. The water subsidy, the fuel allowance and the household benefits package will have to be dealt with by some administrative arrangement or whatever. The Tánaiste is a member of the Economic Management Council and as such she failed to consider the people on low incomes who may not have a taxable income but may not be in receipt of social welfare benefits. I pointed out this fact during the debate on the budget and within 30 minutes of reading the Budget Statement. It was so obvious one could not miss it. How did the proposal get by the Economic Management Council to give high earners a tax cut and give a cut in the water bill to people on certain social welfare payments but to exclude low paid workers? This flies in the face of the back-to-work family dividend. We are trying to get people back to work but there is no provision for a measure to deal with water charges. The logic should be that people on the back-to-work family dividend would qualify for at least the same subsidy for water as those on social welfare payments. I suggest the Government should revisit the entire Irish Water situation. It is right to mention this now because it is referred to in the explanatory memorandum to the Bill.

In her haste to rush this measure through, the Minister forgot about people who lose their jobs. One must be long-term unemployed to receive the fuel allowance. Therefore, a person who loses a job and is out or work for 12 months will not benefit from this announcement. How did the Minister pick out two groups of people to penalise, first, those who lose their jobs and are out of work for up to a year or 15 months and who are not given an allowance and, second, those whom she says she is trying to help by way of the back-to-work family dividend - those on low incomes? All these matters need to be revisited by the Minister because there is a fundamental flaw in her approach to this issue regarding people on low incomes. We will deal separately with the Irish Water issue.

I welcome the increased funding for JobsPlus and JobPath which will be dealt with by means of other administrative arrangements. Abuse of some of these schemes is a concern and they may need to be put on a statutory footing in order that more care can be taken with regard to their implementation.

I agree with a measure in the budget which is to be dealt with by an administrative arrangement or in the Estimates, namely, the extra €2 million for the school meals programme. For the past three weeks I have submitted a Topical Issues matter on the inequality in the payments to some schools. I received information by means of parliamentary questions I tabled in July and I submitted a Topical Issues matter every day for the past four weeks but my matter has not been selected. Some schools are in receipt of ten times more funding per pupil under that scheme than other schools. It is being implemented in an unequal manner. I welcome the additional funding but it is not being delivered in a fair way to children in DEIS schools and in DEIS band 1 schools in particular.

I oppose everything to do with this budget because a person earning more than €70,000 is better off while those earning less than €800 a week are worse off. More than anyone else in Ireland, the Tánaiste is responsible for the increase in homelessness in recent years. Homelessness was not an issue three or four years ago. Her action in cutting the rent supplement in recent years has forced those who can no longer live at home to become homeless. The cut in their rent supplement has meant they cannot afford to rent and landlords are not taking them as tenants. People have ended up sleeping on the streets solely as a result of measures taken by the Minister, Deputy Burton, who is now the Tánaiste.

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