Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It is daft. The Minister had advice prepared for him by officials last year for a question and answer session. When he was asked if the fund would meet the uncertain cost challenges of Brexit, the answer given was that it is vital that the rainy day fund is not earmarked to meet the challenges of which we are already full aware. Sinn Féin knows, as does Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, that Brexit is not an exceptional circumstance because it has been flagged for more than two years. Indeed, the answer that the officials gave the Minister was that the Government and the Oireachtas must take responsibility for addressing these issues and that using the fund to meet the challenge of Brexit would create moral hazard and so on. Brexit is just another idea being used to try to pass this Bill.

The National Pension Reserve Fund was a rainy day fund which was raided by Fianna Fáil to save the banks. It is written here in black and white that one of the potential uses for this fund is a bank crash in the future.

The idea that the Minister can come into this Chamber and talk about reducing our ability to invest is mind-boggling. Does he not see the connection between A and B? A hard Brexit is all the more reason to keep our options open and to be ready to step in with genuine, countercyclical investment policy if and when it is needed.

At 3 p.m., the Minister told us that the level of economic activity will be approximately 4.5% lower than our existing trajectory over the medium term. This aggregate figure hides an even larger hit to our economic activity in labour intensive sectors such as agrifood and indigenous SMEs. At 6 p.m., he came into the House and asked us to support this Bill which will drastically reduce our capacity to respond in sectors such as agrifood and to protect our SMEs. There is no joined-up thinking in this policy.

We know from the Minister's briefing that the rainy day fund cannot be used to meet the challenges of Brexit. It is stated in the information we obtained through freedom of information. If the Minister wishes to produce a genuine rainy day fund, Sinn Féin will be all ears but we reject this sham rainy day fund, which in reality is a bank bailout fund because it ties our hands precisely at a time we need maximum flexibility. The Minister should go back to the drawing board with Fianna Fáil, his partners in government.

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