Gino Kenny (Dublin Mid West, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

As with all budgets, the devil is in the detail and this budget is no different. Since 2008, the social damage done by successive budgets has been incalculable. For the average person listening today, the budget will not change their economic situation one iota. The housing crisis, which is the crisis of our time, still rages without abate. At this very moment, there are over 1,500 families in emergency accommodation. This situation is not only completely unacceptable, but the measures in this budget do not go anywhere near challenging the fundamental issue of why so many families find themselves in this position.

The announcement by the Minister of €105 million for the housing assistance payment, HAP, scheme only copper-fastens the desocialisation of social housing. This will only compound the already long waiting times for people to be housed by the local authority. Essentially, what the Minister announced on Tuesday is a boon to landlordism and the construction industry. It is misleading to state that 21,000 applicants for social housing will have their housing needs met. I say this as a person who has been a council tenant, as my family have been. What is wrong with local authorities building houses? I utterly reject and find it offensive that, somehow, local authority housing and the people who seek to be housed by the local authority equate to social problems. Let me be crystal clear. HAP and RAS are not social housing; they are the privatisation of social housing by proxy.

Like many in this House, I have received numerous e-mails, phone calls and correspondence in regard to home care hours. As a former home care worker myself, I know the impact home care hours can have. Some 950 home care packages simply is not enough. The health system is playing catch-up due to the lack of home care hours. Some 8% of the population aged over 65 are in receipt of some form of home care services, and the average is five hours per week, based on need and availability of resources. In 2008, 12.63 million hours were delivered to 55,000 clients whereas, in 2015, seven years later, that figure was down by 2 million. Since 2010, there has been a 17% increase in the number of those aged 65 and over, so there has been no attempt to keep pace with the demand for home care hours and packages. We can clearly see there is a gaping hole in home help hours and packages that still has not been addressed. Although the 650 home care packages are welcome, this does not go far enough, by any stretch of the imagination.

There was a lot of talk in this Chamber about mental health and how the Government would address funding to mental health services. Historically, the mental health budget is 50% less than the average in Britain. In this budget, I cannot see a firm commitment to implementing A Vision for Change in regard to mental health services. Much has been made of the €5 being given to social welfare recipients, including pensioners. The ongoing age discrimination against those under 26 sends out the message that this is no country for young people. Youth unemployment stands at 16%, more than double the figure in 2007. Let us make it relative to other pay increases, namely, the pay rises of €5,000 for Deputies in this House. I want to put on record that Deputies are not worth the rise; they get enough as it is and they are very well paid. Ordinary working people who have been crucified over recent years in taxes, including stealth taxes, do not get anything like the pay rises awarded to Deputies. What makes Deputies so special? Deputies seem to think they are God's gift to pay rises.

Overall, this is the crumbs from the master's table. The vested interests, the very wealthy and the corporations have not been challenged yet again. Until the Government challenges the real reasons for wealth inequality and the nature of our economic and political establishment, we will continue to firefight the scandals of the housing crisis and the two-tier health system.

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