Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

The Social Democrats very much welcome the proposals in respect of wage replacement and the co-operative approach that has been shown in terms of the proposals brought forward by the Irish Congress of Trade Unions and IBEC. We know from all of the academic advice on this and the experience in other European countries that this is the right thing to do and I commend the Minister on that. Wage replacement is clearly critically important to keep workers attached to the workforce, to maintain demand in the economy and liquidity and, essentially, to keep companies afloat because we know from experience in other downturns, particularly the crash, that when companies go to the wall in a recession, very many of them never get back afloat.

That is why it is important to keep as many companies as possible afloat, to keep people attached to them and to keep money in the economy in order that demand is maintained and we will be better placed to reboot the economy when we come through this crisis.

I do think a bit of time was lost. This is a crisis situation for everybody and we might have moved quicker on it. I am not sure also why it takes so long to put the system in place. In the meantime, it is welcome that the welfare payments are to be increased to €350. That, in itself, raises questions if that is deemed to be the minimum that is required to survive in the current circumstances. What does that say then about all of the other welfare rates? One might say that somebody who has suddenly lost his or her job is hit with a lot of unexpected additional costs but the fact of the matter is that there is an impact, not only in terms of health, well-being and anxiety that people are encountering at the moment, but also in the substantial additional costs for all families in coping with the present situation, whether that is difficulties in accessing food, additional heating and lighting costs and other such costs and trying to keep children amused. All of those things have costs associated with them. Where people are or have been just about keeping their head above water on the basic welfare payments, there is not a recognition of those additional costs impacting on families who have been on welfare. My concern is that unless that is recognised, what we are then creating is a two-tier welfare system, which is very undesirable. Points have been made about universal basic income, which I support. Coming out of this crisis I hope we will learn lots of new ways of doing things and that we will maintain some of those new systems, in particular in respect of income support, the health service, childcare, all of those things which I hope will not be undone but it is not desirable that we would have a two-tier system and I would welcome a response to the issue. It is those people who are in receipt of welfare payments who are on the lowest incomes who are likely to take the brunt of the crisis that is affecting all of us at the moment and that is not acceptable.

I also have a couple of questions on the operation of Part 7, in particular the provisions of section 26(3). Does this infer that payment will be made in arrears? If that is the case, how can company cashflow sustain that? Otherwise, how does the business prove the 25% reduction over the period specified? I know the Minister has had to move into this very quickly but there are questions that arise in that regard.

The Minister is aware that moneylenders have been to the fore recently in the media. Following on from what I said, there are lots of families in a highly vulnerable position financially. What we see now is licensed home collection moneylenders going on a marketing spree and calling around to people's homes at a time when they are particularly vulnerable and offering them cash. As we know, the charge is 187% APR. That, in itself, is problematic and should have been dealt with by now. As we do not want people to get into further difficulty by this kind of promotion of very expensive debt, could the Minister put out some message about that and encourage people to use the services that already exist, such as MABS and the credit unions?

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