John McGuinness (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I join Deputy Eoghan Murphy's comments on how we set out the budget strategy. We debate measures after the event. For example, we are debating the Social Welfare Bill after the announcements have been made in the budget. It is true that for years, every Government and Opposition has called for reform in the House, but we never seem to get it. There is a need for reform, but this Government did not bring it about despite being mandated to do so. That is a pity. Had there been reform, the budgetary process could have been fed into by Deputies who deal with matters in their constituencies every week that show up the faults of a system. If Deputies could use that knowledge in a meaningful debate that brought about real policy change, it would be exceptionally good, not only for the Department, but for the people who found themselves having to engage with social welfare. Instead, the budget debate sees a tinkering with the system - €5 here, a cut there and a change in regulation somewhere else - but no strategic thinking on where we are going with social welfare, job activation and care for pensioners and the marginalised. Not all of us will march to the same frantic drumbeat. There will always be those who must be looked after in society. If we are to acknowledge this fact, we should do so efficiently and well.

I question the four people who run the Cabinet and the country. I consider their qualifications and the last time they created a job or were on the front line looking into the abyss and had nothing. It was a long time ago. Without personalising the debate, the Taoiseach has been in the House for a long number of years.

The same is true of the Tánaiste, the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Howlin, and the Minister for Finance. I do not suggest they do not hear things at their constituency clinics that influence them one way or the other. However, this simply is not a good way in which to do business. People are making decisions who, quite frankly, are not able to be influenced by debate in this Chamber and it is meaningless unless this can be the case.

I acknowledge it is the job of Government party Members to pick out the best and to deliver the message for the various parties. Members of my party did it when they were on the Government side of the House as well. However, if one considers the measures in the context of what I see in my clinics, there is a huge delay in the processing of applications. For example, in the case of carer's allowance applications, six or nine months could elapse before someone gets an application for a carer's allowance through. Moreover, if it is refused and goes to review, appeal or oral hearing, it will take much longer. I have seen cases in the system that have been there for more than 12 months. At times, those who really are entitled to such an allowance are refused it for some unknown reason. These people have made a good case, have presented their medical information and are looking after someone, but yet they are put through the wringer excessively in respect of qualifying for carer's allowance. The same applies if one considers the appeals system itself. It simply goes on forever and at the end of that line, one is dealing with someone who has no money, probably is in receipt of supplementary welfare allowance and probably is entitled to what he or she is getting. Consequently, I seek an audit of all these applications, how they are processed, how long it takes and how quickly they then can be turned around into an efficient and positive return for the client who has been forced by circumstances to seek social welfare benefits. Were the Minister of State to set his mind to this and were he to achieve it, he would be doing a great deal for those who are marginalised and have nothing. If, at the end of the process, the answer was the applicant was not entitled to the benefit for which he or she had applied, at least then the applicant knows. However, it is just unforgivable to leave people in limbo and to have them go back into the system repeatedly. I do not suggest it is the fault of the Minister of State; it is the fault of Members here in this House that they do not recognise it and then, if necessary, force the people on the Minister of State's right, that is, the departmental officials, to bring about the appropriate changes in policies that will make the system more efficient.

Another point about efficiency that is evident at the meetings of the Committee of Public Accounts is that each year, millions of euro are lost to the Exchequer because of what the Department of Social Protection puts down as being a fraud or errors in the system. If a business had fraud and errors that were losing €500 million through that process each year, it would be bust. The Department of Social Protection, like many other Departments does not learn from the mistakes. It does not learn that this is how something happened and, therefore, it should apply itself to ensure it does not happen again. How many more people in receipt of social welfare benefits would be satisfied with an increased benefit or would benefit from a saving in respect of these losses? The Department would have €500 million more to ease the pain and the burden on those who are in receipt of social welfare benefits. Sometimes, it is not a question of securing the increase that is the challenge or the success story; it actually is taking the system and making it work more efficiently and for those who must engage with it because of their circumstances. I ask the Minister of State to give consideration to this point.

All Members have heard about the difficulties arising in respect of the JobBridge scheme. I came across a number of people who were employed in a sporting area who were let go and subsequently replaced by a person from the JobBridge scheme. That does not achieve anything and is just a waste of time. It may be nice to massage the figures afterwards and, incidentally, all Governments do that. This is not a direct criticism of the present Administration as it has been done in the past. However, the Government would not allow this to happen in respect of the establishment of new businesses. One could not get a grant from a county enterprise board if a similar business was nearby, as that would be called displacement. Yet, there is a willingness to tolerate displacement in the JobBridge area. This has not been thought out and it is not working to the extent it should to bring the success to the scheme that was planned for initially. It would be worthwhile to consider this issue.

The issue of domiciliary care allowance has been raised here and, in particular, women came to Leinster House and raised it. While I acknowledge some effort has been made to streamline it and make it more effective, many more simple things could be done that would deal with this issue and would bring about an understanding from the applicant as to what is required in an application. The simple comparison made by the mothers and those who were concerned about the domiciliary care allowance when they visited Leinster House was that were the Department of Social Protection to take the application form used in the United Kingdom and use it here, it would simplify matters and would allow them to focus on what the Department really was examining. That is what they sought and suggested, but I must tell the Minister of State and his officials that they left Leinster House seriously disappointed that the engagement they were allowed to have with the Minister and the system did not yield for them the simple changes they perceived to be necessary to make life easier for them and others in the context of the application. Again, this reverts to systems and to an application form.

This is similar to the time when the rental allowance scheme was being operated by the Department of Social Protection. When the figures began to reach an almighty high, no one paused to say this scheme was not fulfilling the housing needs where it should be. No one thought of diverting the funds in question to building local authority houses and giving people secure homes. Everything just went on in the same vein and nothing really has changed that much. The Government now has put in place the housing assistance payment, HAP, scheme, which is the same nonsense with a different description. It is the same thing. When will we get around to having a reform that gives local authority houses to people, thereby giving them a sense of a home and a sense of place? It would also give people a sense that the Government actually cares for them, because the main message to come out of a lot of these issues is the Government does not care - be it the previous Government or its predecessors - because people do not perceive the necessary reform that would have a positive impact on their lives. Members owe it to those who elected them to stand by the mandate the Government was given, which is for reform and greater efficiencies.

Before the budget, Members spoke of those who were self-employed. They came through the good times, paid their taxes, were employed and were central to the economy. Now however, they do not get anything from the economy. They are forced to leave these shores and seek employment elsewhere. We are losing an entire generation, a lot of whom were enthusiastic entrepreneurs, some of whom were employed by others but in the same vein as an entrepreneur, and they are gone. An entire generation of knowledge and experience has departed from these shores simply because the system would not look after them. Moreover, they were not lifers but wanted access to the system while they got on their feet, after which they would be back creating employment. Members are looking to the small to medium-sized enterprise sector to create the same level of employment as previously, namely, almost 1 million give or take, and now those people have left and are gone.

The greatest con trick in the budget and what has happened subsequently is the Government gave small increases.

Small as they are, those increases are welcome, but taking the money back in the form of water charges is just a joke. In its current form, Irish Water needs to generate a certain level of income from water charges that will allow it to pay both the wages of its bloated complement of staff and the extras and top-ups it has introduced for them and also to pay for the services of consultants. Deputy O'Dowd is aware of what is going on within Irish Water and he was correct in highlighting it. One cannot create a super-quango such as Irish Water which is going to feed off the unfortunates in society who do not have anything in order to obtain its income and then state that an entire raft of people will not be obliged to pay water charges. How does the Government propose to balance the books in this regard, particularly if it is going to exempt certain individuals from paying or give them a number of credits? Somebody must pay for Irish Water. I suggest that the Government abolish the latter and not charge people for water. It should instead consider how the open taxation system which previously held sway might be restructured. As the Minister of State, Deputy Kevin Humphreys, is aware, Europe is telling us that we must raise cash and deal with our loans off the books. In order to do this, one must create an entity. We refer to such entities as quangos and the one we established was Irish Water. What is wrong with county councils dealing with leaks in the system, etc.? If one contacts Irish Water to report a burst pipe, it will be fixed by staff from one's local friendly county council. What is happening now is that we are being obliged to pay for an extra level of bureaucracy which is just not needed. Nobody identified either the quantity of leaks within the system or the number of pipes which must be replaced.

What has all of this to do with the Social Welfare Bill? The answer is that those in receipt of social welfare payments are going to be obliged to pay water charges. The Minister of State's party is obliged to appease its supporters, which is what the Labour Party should be all about. I respect the input of the Labour Party into this Government's work but its members must be stronger, they must represent the people and they need to tell the fat cats to whom they often referred when they were on the Opposition side of the House to get off the bus. Those so-called fat cats are not doing the job they were appointed to do. That job could be done more efficiently and at less cost elsewhere. Those are the facts.

When one considers the increases people received in the budget and then examines the position with regard to the taxes - water tax, property tax etc. - they are obliged to pay, one must ask how they can afford to live. I have met older people who are not putting food on the table in order to make ends meet. These individuals are members of a generation of men and women who like to pay their bills. I am sure that, like me, the Minister of State has been informed by such people at his clinics that they would not like to die owing money. We are creating a situation whereby, in light of the establishment of the fair deal scheme and everything else, they will die owing money. Is there no humanity or compassion in the system at all? Are we simply striding towards the European model where everyone is a number and where interventions by public representatives are considered a nuisance? It will only be when we, as public representatives, take charge of policy and force it into place and actually begin to represent the people who elected us that we will garner more respect and be in a position to respond to the needs of society.

In the context of the small things, I wish to refer to alarms and the telephone allowance for the elderly. These are things which make them safe in their homes. Do we not understand what we have done to these people? We have forced them to apply for medical cards through the system that has been put in place only for them to be informed that their applications have not been received. They must then go through the whole rigamarole again of completing what is a very long form and obtaining doctors' letters and resubmitting their applications. Those applications are then either refused or placed under review and the people involved are obliged to lodge appeals. In the name of God, what are we doing to those we represent? These people have served this country for generations. They worked harder than we have ever worked and they saw bad times of a type we have never seen.

We call the country in which we live a republic. The Minister of State is a republican and so am I. Would he treat his people in the way I have described? If he is a republican, he should not. Would a republican dip his or her hand into the pockets of citizens and take money out of them? I do not believe so. We will be celebrating the centenary of the Easter Rising in 2016. Is ours the type of country for which those who took part in the Rising died? I do not believe it to be. The country they wanted would have been one in which the common good and people and their homes would have been central and which would have been willing to support those who are marginalised and elderly. All I want of this Parliament is for it to ensure that the elderly and those who are marginalised will be looked after. I am also seeking that those in government should fulfil the first responsibility of Government, namely, to care for the people and ensure they are safe. Governments have failed in that responsibility. They have failed to keep the people safe. As a result, elderly people throughout the country are terrorised not by the fear that their homes may be broken into but as a result of the fact that they do not count anymore and their belief that the Government is after them. This big State of Ireland is frightening the life out of its citizens, which is a disgrace. This has been happening for so long that we do not even notice it. We are scaring the living daylights out of people who are on waiting lists or in hospital and elderly individuals who want just a little money, comfort and an acknowledgement of their plight. However, we are running away from them.

The Labour Party has always been respected in Irish society as a result of its efforts to defend those who are marginalised and less well off. I urge the Minister of State and his party colleagues to put the pressure on within Government and to remember the people who elected them and who they represent.

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