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

We will save the conversation for Committee Stage and we will still do it through the Chair at that point. My apologies for not sticking to the formal process. I do not think we are in a financial emergency. I have listened to Minister after Minister, the Taoiseach, the Tánaiste and everybody else explaining to the people who wonderfully well the country is doing, how great the country is and how it is the greatest little country in which to do business. Nothing the Government has said is consistent with the Minister stating that we continue to grapple with a financial emergency which needs to be brought under control. The Minister is rightly concerned. He said, "Commencing the orderly wind down of this legislation in an agreed and sustainable process, rather than risking a successful legal challenge, is the appropriate and prudent approach [to take]."

Many people would question whether the Government can say we are in a financial emergency in light of the recent announcement, which gives the lie to the assertion that there is such an emergency. There was a financial emergency and, in that context, I will return and deal in specific detail with the report the Minister issued to the Oireachtas in June. Ireland has done well. We have come through the financial emergency and we must be careful and prudent. However, if somebody challenged this in a court, no judge would say there is a financial emergency.

The expenditure ceiling for 2015, announced 12 months ago on budget day 2014, was €53.626 billion. The actual expenditure for 2015, announced last week on budget day, October 2015, was €54.875 billion, an excess of approximately €1.25 billion. People are talking about Supplementary Estimates of the order of €1.5 billion. I do not know what will be the exact figure because we have not seen the details yet. Last week, the expenditure ceilings for 2016 were announced. We are talking about expenditure of up to €55.275 billion, which is another €382 million on top of the Supplementary Estimates of €1.249 billion for 2015. Over those few days last week, at the stroke of a pen, expenditure for 2015 was increased by €1.249 billion. On budget day, it was also announced that expenditure for 2016 will be opening with an extra €1.249 million to match the Supplementary Estimate for the coming year, 2016. In addition, new measures of approximately €400 million or more were announced. I estimate that in those few days the Government announced an extra €2.89 billion in expenditure for the 15-month period from October 2015 to the end of 2016. It is almost €3 billion extra and in the region of €1.5 billion in Supplementary Estimates. With the same amount added into the opening figures for next year and new initiatives announced on budget day of several hundred million, it is inconceivable that the Government can increase expenditure by €3 billion while trying to tell people there is a financial emergency. I question the feasibility of doing so.

At a particular point we mentioned the possibility of having a discussion - perhaps on Committee Stage - regarding the annual review and report to the Houses of the Oireachtas under section 12 of the FEMPI legislation, which was published in June 2015. We did not have opportunity to do so. Perhaps the committee schedules were too full or we did not have time in the House. I am not arguing on it. While some people might find this a dry topic to discuss, we are elected to do so. Members who deal with public expenditure and the finance committee are elected to do this job. The report examined the economic context and stated that real GDP in 2014 was still 2% lower than that of 2007. However, we have probably now surpassed the peak figure of 2007.

The Minister's report also states that the economic recovery is well under way, but goes on to state that, "while recent improvements in competitiveness have been beneficial, it is important to highlight that as a small, open economy the Irish economy is particularly susceptible to external risks". It mentions oil prices, the situation in Greece, unconventional monetary policy, low interest rates and the current low inflation rate. Using this is a formula, we could be in surplus and have no debt and the Government could say we are still in a financial emergency because we are a small open economy susceptible to oil prices, low inflation, low interest rates and the Greek situation. This is not an acceptable reason for saying Ireland should continue to be in a state of emergency.

The Minister's report mentions tax receipts. This year, income tax receipts are predicted to be higher than they were at the height of the boom. The report refers to general Government debt measures as part of the justification for the continued existence of the financial emergency. The Tánaiste and leader of the Labour Party, Deputy Burton, said here that in a year's time our debt will reach the European average. This is not an emergency situation, unless somebody tells Angela Merkel she has an emergency in her country, the debt levels of which those of Ireland match. I do not buy it and nobody else would. It is important that there be a bit of realism. I am not talking about unwinding everything in FEMPI. Rather, I am referring to being real and calling a spade a spade. There is no financial emergency. We have announced an extra €3 billion of expenditure for the period between October of this year and the end of next year. This does not tally with what one would expect during a financial emergency. No judge could reconcile the two. He or she could only conclude, based on the Government's actions, that there is no financial emergency.

The Minister referred to the consideration of the need to continue the provisions of the Act and I understand what he is saying. I am raising matters here that I could have raised on Committee Stage, had there been a committee meeting. One group about which I am also particularly concerned is the Alliance of Retired Public Servants. The Minister met the group several times. There are approximately 240,000 retired public servants and they were denied access to the Croke Park and Haddington Road talks because these involved discussions on pay, whereas those to whom I refer are in receipt of pensions.

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