Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I sometimes think that when the Deputy comments on the Government's budgetary strategy, she fails to accept that choices must be made.

We have had to make a choice this year to assume the worst possible outcome to the Brexit negotiations. This has been necessary to ensure we have a resilient budget for next year. The Deputy's response to the budget largely ignores all of that. We have put in place a social welfare package which increases the social welfare spend by €170 million next year. We have deliberately prioritised and targeted the most vulnerable people for these extra supports. The Minister, Deputy Regina Doherty, has repeatedly outlined where they are. We are ensuring the overall budget is fit for purpose for next year. For the past three years in a row, we have had annual increases of €5 in social welfare and pensions across the board. This was well ahead of inflation. We took this approach deliberately because we wanted to give back some money while the country could afford to do it. We will get back into that space again when we know we can afford to do it. We felt that rather than giving small increases across the board, it was more appropriate to target the lowest-income households, people living alone and people on fuel allowance.

We chose to protect the people on the lowest incomes because we knew they would be affected by Government policy, including the increase in carbon tax. We gave them the support they need to reflect that. That is what we did. We do not pretend otherwise. We had to make difficult choices in the context of the economic challenges that may well be on the horizon. Clearly, Deputy Shortall does not seem to be willing to make those choices. The idea that we should not introduce a carbon tax increase is counter to what practically every climate change expert on the planet is saying. Nobody is saying that increasing carbon tax will solve the climate change issue on its own. By giving a clear direction of the charges that are to be imposed over the next ten years as a means of placing a value on carbon into the future, we are giving society an indication of the kind of change it needs to accommodate. It is a modest enough increase, but it is a signal of the direction we are taking for the next ten years. We have put in place measures to compensate the lowest-income families for that. It is not true to say one cannot draw down grant aid unless one has resources. Some €53 million is being provided for the warmer homes scheme, which is targeted at people on fuel allowance. The poorest people are those who will get support from the State.

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