Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the motion and I will support it. I will also support the amendments. In budget 2012, a Labour Party Minister in her first budget cut the social protection budget by €475 million. This was following a cut of €810 million in 2010 and €515 million in 2009 under Fianna Fáil. In 2012, a total of €1.8 billion had been taken out of people's pockets, the pockets of those who needed protection who were reeling the most from the recession. Deputy Burton announced and continued to announce that primary weekly social welfare payments would be protected. We in the Opposition knew then this was not the case, and it has now been clearly demonstrated that she did not protect those payments.

I remember discussing the cut during the guillotined debate in the Chamber. It was a really cunning cut because it went under the radar and not many people understood exactly what it meant. The Government knew that those affected, who were mostly women, would not realise the change until they hit pension age, and it hoped they would be isolated and would not cause a fuss and it would continue on. People were shocked and angry at what they met when they hit pension age.

The gender discrepancy was clear in an analysis done in 2011. The Department of Social Protection was aware that thousands of mainly women in low-paid work, would lose out, but it went ahead. Deputy Burton was not for turning. It looks like the Labour Party is for turning now that it is in opposition. No wonder people in this country are so cynical about politics. There was talk of some measure of restitution by introducing a homemaker's credit scheme, but this was passed to the Department of Finance, which stated it did not have the money. The Minister does not need to do an analysis because it is already there.

The Taoiseach was very disingenuous this morning when he stated many of those affected even under the previous scheme would not receive a full pension. How sneaky is that comment? There is a huge difference between being down by €4.50 of the full pension and being down by €30 of the full pension. On 31 August 2012, workers retiring with an average of 21 annual PRSI payments throughout their working lives received a contributory pension of €225. The workers who retired two days later who made up to 29 contributions per year received €196, which is €30 less. The bands were changed and were broadened out from four to six. In particular, band 2 was divided into three, with the lowest band of 20 to 29 average contributions getting just 85% of the minimum payment, whereas before it would have been 98%, and the other two bands were reduced from 65% to 40% and from 75% to 50%.

I support the motion, but ask why Fianna Fáil did not make this a key demand during its discussions with Fine Gael as part of the confidence and supply agreement. Why did it not make it a principle and something under which lines should be drawn, and even threaten to bring down the Government if necessary, if it thought it was so important? Some people would say this is a cynical political ploy by Fianna Fáil. I do not know whether or not it is, but people can make up their own minds on that.

The Minister must end this pension discrimination and gender discrimination against women and the people affected by this measure. The Government should remove the bands and go back to the 2012 system and then deal with the general overall pension issue.

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