Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I start by referencing the fact that just a couple of hours ago, the courts finally imposed a penalty of six years on David Drumm who was, in many ways, the man who sank Ireland along with the bank that sank Ireland. As we look at the budget figures, we should bear in mind that this man organised a fraud amounting to €7.2 billion. For most people, €7.2 million would sound like a lot of money.

The particular arrangements he entered into to mislead in regard to the Anglo Irish accounts cost our taxpayers, our citizens, in fact, every man, woman and child in this country much misery that continues to this day, unfortunately, with regard to cleaning up the mess of the banks. It is ten years since all of this happened. It has taken a very long time for justice to be served. Ten years ago the bankers were telling us what to do and that everything was okay, which was wrong. The Minister needs to be careful when simply relying on the advice of bankers. I want the Minister to make a commitment that despite all of the special pleading going on at the moment about the restoration of bankers' bonuses, there should be no consideration of any of that until we have got all of that money back from the bankers, which is what our citizens deserve.

The summer economic statement shows there is up to €2.2 billion available in the fiscal space for new measures in budget 2019 before any new revenue raising or saving measures. The Minister for Finance and the Department are misleading the public debate. Political decisions made by the Minister and Fine Gael are limiting this to €800 million, although, obviously, there will be adjustments on budget day. A further €2.6 billion has already been committed. The Minister needs to clarify for us if a 2:1 ratio of expenditure to tax cuts continues to apply to budget measures. I would prefer a 3:1 ratio. We agree with the ESRI that it is not appropriate to talk about income tax cuts but I know that, in the context of a forthcoming election, it is something Fine Gael is wedded to and I am sure we will see some of that.

The Minister for Finance has decided to commit €500 million to a rainy day fund and leave a further €900 million unspent. These are policy decisions the Minister is making that are also deliberately misleading the public debate. The Irish people, who have made huge sacrifices over the last decade to correct the public finances, deserve to know the full facts. With €2.6 billion already committed to meeting the costs of policy decisions made last year, as I said, we do not know if the 2:1 ratio Fine Gael ratio is being maintained, or whether Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil have agreed budget measures that will encompass the extra capital spending this includes, or if this will just apply to the €800 million the Minister is proposing to allocate in October.

I want to ask the Minister about the settlement announced in respect of consultants' pay. As I understand it, that settlement is €200 million in back pay plus €60 million a year. Is that money accounted for in the summer economic statement or is it something which will be pencilled in? This was the subject of a court case but I want to know the position in regard to the section 39 organisations I have raised with the Minister time and again, such as the people who work in our hospices, helping people and families faced with terminal illnesses, those who work in rehab providing vital services to people with different kinds of disabilities and needs, and those who work with the Irish Wheelchair Association, to give just three examples. Is it the Minister's intention to rectify this and offer them compensation for the cuts they took? Is that provided for in this statement? Is it simply going to be ignored or will it be a budget day adjustment? The Minister should come clean with us on whether that issue is going to be rectified?

In the midst of a housing crisis and huge capacity issues in our health system with, unbelievably, over 700,000 people on waiting lists, the summer economic statement as structured is ignoring these capacity problems within the health service that the Sláintecare report shows need urgent strategic investment. As yet, as I understand it, we do not even have an executive officer in charge of Sláintecare and its implementation office. That was a product of new politics agreed to by everybody in the Dáil. Is the establishment of Sláintecare in any way assumed in the summer economic statement? That is another question on which we are entitled to an answer. Front-loading investment into public housing would go much further in protecting our society and economy, reducing reliance on the private rented sector and providing security to families across Ireland. This is something the Minister needs to discuss and debate with us.

The Minister has used concerns about corporation tax to justify a rainy day fund but if there is fluctuation in the money coming in, we need to take action to make our tax base more secure. Measures to do that could include implementing a minimum effective rate of corporation tax. It would also go some way to start to repair the damage that has been done to our international reputation arising from some of the tax cases currently being pursued, and the spectre of companies which are effectively paying no tax and banks which are being given an opt-out from paying any tax for possibly as long as 20 years. We could also look at the overall composition of tax revenue to see whether it would be resilient if there was a sudden economic downturn, as could be caused by a disorderly Brexit. Ireland already has a rainy day fund in the form of the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund and significant shareholdings in the banks that provide a buffer for future shocks. It is not true that this economy does not have buffers, and the Minister knows this quite well. The fiscal strategy the Government is pursuing is an effort to avoid a repeat of past mistakes but, instead, it is failing to address the crisis people in Ireland are facing today. This crisis feeds into the economy and leads the economy to a situation where it will not achieve its productive capacity.

That is why the suggestion by the Minister that a portion of corporation tax revenue should be allocated to the Government's proposed rainy day fund lacks economic coherence. The Minister for Finance is trying to create something that does not exist in Irish law. No distinction is made between money coming from income tax, VAT or corporation tax. As the Minister knows, there is no hypothecation of taxes in Ireland, even when almost everybody agrees that it may be a good idea, for example, in regard to taxes on fizzy drinks and so on. We are talking in a vacuum about something that is a very imperfect idea. All tax revenues go into the Central Fund. The idea that excess corporation tax should go into a rainy day fund is neither sensible nor desirable. The notion of a rainy day fund has not been thought through. State finances do not work like those of a company or a household.

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