Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I also welcome the opportunity to contribute to this evening's debate on budget 2018. This is the first budget in ten years about which we can say that we are balancing our books. The money that is going out is equal to the money coming in. This is a significant milestone which should not be underestimated. It means that, as a country, we are moving towards more secure economic waters in which we are balancing our economy and putting in place a sustainable plan to safeguard our national finances. The ratio of expenditure to tax cuts is 2:1. Twice as much is given over to capital and current spending than tax cuts. We want to achieve two things with this. First, we want to reward work and make it pay for the 225,000 people who are back working. We need to make sure that it pays for them to go back to work so we are reducing the tax on work without narrowing our tax base. We are reducing the lower rate of USC from 2.5% to 2% and the higher rate from 5% to 4.75%. We are lifting the threshold of the lower rate of USC to ensure that those who are on the minimum wage, which is increasing, will not pay the higher rate. We are increasing the threshold at which the higher rate of income tax applies. This is to ensure that people who are on modest incomes do not pay the higher rate.

To look at expenditure, next year we will spend more than €60 billion, which includes €5.3 billion on capital infrastructure and more than €55 billion on current spending. We need to ensure that we use the recovery, for which the people sacrificed a great deal, to improve our services and support for families, but we must also recognise that there are those who cannot work and who need additional help.

If we look at investment in health, 1,800 new front-line staff will be employed. An additional €55 million will be spent on the national treatment purchase fund and there will be additional home care packages, notwithstanding that we are working on a statutory scheme to ensure that those people who want to remain in their homes will be able to do so. We have allocated additional funding for mental health and, if I am not mistaken, if we take into account promises from last year's budget, those made this year and those made looking forward to next year, there will have been an increase of more than €90 million over three years, which is a significant increase.

Education will receive its highest budget ever. It is up €1 billion under Fine Gael and will provide 1,300 new schoolteachers and 1,000 new special needs assistants while reducing the pupil-teacher ratio to 26:1. In child care Tusla will receive extra funding. In justice there will be 800 new gardaí. There is additional funding allocated for disability provision. There is also additional funding for the most vulnerable in our society, including increases in social welfare payments, carer's allowance, unemployment assistance, disability allowance, the one-parent family payment and the family income supplement. All of this is progress. Of course there are areas in which we would like to see more progress, but it is a significant start.

I welcome the measure introduced to mitigate any negative impacts from Brexit. We do not know what the outcome of those negotiations will be but we will be developing a €300 million loan fund for small and medium enterprises and introducing a €25 million fund specifically for the agrifood sector. These are necessary and vital supports for our industries across the board. There will be additional funding to double the amount of people working on Brexit related issues in our State agencies, which is welcome. New supports for capital investment in the food industry, for Bord Bia and for marketing and promotion activities have been announced. These measures, along with the investment in developing a new rainy day fund from 2019, will assist our small and medium enterprises, our agricultural sector and Ireland as a whole in tackling the challenges which may arise as a result of Brexit or any other unforeseen threats.

My Department has received an increase in funding which will help Ireland in its task of doubling its global footprint. The fact that we did not close any of our embassies during the economic downturn has contributed to placing Ireland at the front and centre of the current Brexit negotiations. The announcement of my colleague, the Minister, Deputy Simon Coveney, yesterday of new Irish embassies and consulates is an important first step in expanding and our global footprint and diversifying our trade portfolio as we prepare for Brexit.

While Brexit is happening we in Ireland need to continue the discussion around the future of Europe. While the UK may be leaving the EU, we will not be and, while we are losing a close ally, we need to build strategic alliances and lay out the type of Europe we want. That is why I welcome the increase in funding to my Department to support the future of Europe debate which I will be launching in the coming weeks. I am looking forward to leading this civic dialogue and engaging with people about what they want from Europe and how it can work better for them.

I welcome the €8 million increase in funding for the pyrite remediation scheme. This will see a total budget of €30 million next year. This will allow for an additional 430 homes to be remediated. It is an issue which has impacted upon many families, not least in my own county of Meath. Since the scheme was established, some 250 homes in Meath have been remediated which represents an investment of €17.5 million. I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Damien English, in that regard.

Obviously while the pyrite remediation scheme deals with people who are already in their homes, I am acutely aware that there are those who are not - those who are struggling to find accommodation and those who are in emergency accommodation. I welcome the many measures which have been introduced to tackle this problem which we face at the moment while also recognising the different needs of the overall population.

This is not a giveaway budget. Yes, there are areas in which we would like to see more progress and we hope to continue work in those areas in the coming years but overall this is a positive budget. It seeks to put the people of Ireland first. We want to ensure fairness for those in need, to reward those in work and to protect our country from any future global shocks. We cannot go back to the boom and bust economic model which has failed us so many times. We need to provide certainty to families and businesses by making sensible, long-term investments which benefit and into the future. I support this budget as I believe it does just that.

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