Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I congratulate the Taoiseach on the fact that in less than six months he has managed to reduce the claimed cost of his tax cut promise in half without changing anything about it. At the weekend he claimed that there were clear plans in place for public services and social policies and that they all could be implemented and still leave room for a tax cut which supposedly is so significant that it is the only new budget policy announced since the budget. People will be aware of a detailed and costed proposal that the Taoiseach developed in opposition before the last general election when he said he would abolish the universal social charge. He said in an interview at the weekend that the Government had given very detailed consideration to the proposals and that it proposed to abolish USC at the cost of billions of euro.

Of course, it was abandoned as soon as the election came in afterwards. On this proposal, has the Government prepared any particular study or is it still relying on the documents published with the budget last year? We still do not have full transparency on the budgetary figures for next year in terms of what is available next year to spend. What is the amount that the Government will have at its disposal within the fiscal framework and rules to allocate to services and to tax issues?

In recent days the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection has said once again she believes the pension increases for old age pensioners, which we insisted on in the last budget and the one before, should be reduced and kept in line with lower benchmarks. The Taoiseach will remember that in August 2017, the Minister announced that Fine Gael was not committed to a pension increase of €5 and that the money should go elsewhere. After that bit of honesty, there was an attempt at a massive clean-up operation, which ended in the ridiculous sight of Fine Gael Ministers issuing press releases claiming credit for pension increases they had actually opposed. The clear implication of the Minister's words is that this determination to reduce pension increases below levels received by other groups remains as strong as ever and is core Fine Gael policy. Will the Taoiseach confirm that the Minister is not going rogue and that she has the right to speak on behalf of her party and the Government on pension matters? If, on the other hand, she is going rogue and the Taoiseach does not support her statements, will he be taking any action to correct the record?

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