Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Minister will know well that the women he mentioned in his response are not the women I am addressing in terms of equality budgeting. I wish each one of those women well in the posts they hold, but each one of them is in a well-paid position for the responsibilities and duties they will carry out on behalf of the State. They are not the ones who need equality budgeting to be enshrined in law to ensure they are protected. Although I am not privy to their salary, few of those women would be earning less than €100,000. That is not what we are talking about. What we are talking about is the Minister's record on inequality.

I refer to the consistent cuts, for example, in Traveller education and support, in tackling the scourge of drugs, in particular, in the capital city, in services for people with disabilities and access to front-line services. I also refer to taking away the medical card from children with life-limiting conditions. These are the types of issues on which the Government has earned an F grade in terms of equality. I do not refer to the fact that the Government appointed women to some of the highest levels of authority in the State. This is not about gender equality; it is about budgeting equality. It is about how the decisions the Minister has taken impact on certain sections of society. While these might be small in terms of the overall magnitude of cuts and tax increases that have taken place, they affect key areas. Some of the most deprived groups is society had very little to start with, but were left with less as a result of these cuts. That is something that should have been targeted, challenged and identified as a result of equality budgeting. I stand over my argument on equality budgeting.

The Minister outlined a clear and rational position to the effect that there is a motion before the House and it is standard practice that we give the proposer of the motion the due courtesy of hearing the response to it. That is fine. It is right and proper that the Minister would afford such a courtesy to the Technical Group, the proposers of the Private Members' motion that will be debated later. I only wish the Minister would afford me the same courtesy, because I put forward the proposal before the Technical Group. We are dealing with two different issues. My amendment seeks to have a legislative basis for equality proofing of this year's budget. This is the time and place for the debate on the amendment that is before the House, but for some reason the Minister does not wish to inform me of what he plans to do next year with the budget or with this budget because I am not due the same courtesy from him as is the Minister for Finance, in terms of my amendment which is before the House and on which we will vote in the coming minutes. I am not deemed worthy of the same type of regard the Minister will rightly afford to the Technical Group proposers. I wonder why I am not.

There is a weakness in the Minister's argument because when Private Members' motions are put forward, one of the first things that happen is the Government briefs the media about what it intends to do, approximately two days' before the debate, to take the sting out of the tail. The Government's response to the motion is usually in the Sunday newspapers three days before the proposal is debated. If memory serves me, our proposal for equality budgeting was the script that ran at that point. I am disappointed no legislative basis is being afforded to equality budgeting at this point. As a result of that, and the Minister's comments, I have no option but to press the amendment.

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