Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE) | Oireachtas source

Everything possible has to be done to allow workers to effectively socially distance.

We need to ensure workers do not have a situation where they are laid off in this crisis not to be taken on again in the future or to be taken on at lower pay rates and worse conditions. We need to ensure all workers are guaranteed a continuation of their jobs and employment rights. We must ensure all workers who are affected by the coronavirus and should not or cannot go to work for any variety of reasons, namely because they are self-isolating, minding children, looking after vulnerable people or their work is not continuing because it is non-essential work, are guaranteed 100% of their income. Workers’ lives are built not around 70% but around 100% of their income. While 70% is a definite improvement on what we were facing before, it is not enough unless one has a situation where rents or utility bills are frozen, as in do not have to be paid for the period of the crisis. Unless that happens, then workers need to get 100% of their wages and we have an amendment tabled to do that. This should be paid for, particularly by big businesses from the profits they have accumulated, unless on the basis of proven need, as will be the case for many small businesses, that they simply cannot do that.

I want to raise a broader point relating to a point made by the Taoiseach on St. Patrick's Day, which I thought was significant. Then he said that the bill for dealing with the coronavirus crisis will be enormous and may take years to pay. The question of who is going to pay that bill is going to be a central question in this country and around the world for the coming years. As the crisis deepens and the months go by, will we see massive bailouts for the airline industry, banking system and the hotel industry? Are these bailouts going to be paid for by workers over the next several years? Instead, will we see a bailout for workers starting now, guaranteeing 100% of income that is good not just for the workers and their families but for society and the real economy to ensure there is not a downward spiral in terms of demand?

The bottom line in my opinion is that workers must not pay the price, now or in the future. There are simple things which can be done now by the Government to raise the revenue to deal with this crisis, rather than placing it on the shoulders of workers in the future. First, the Government must immediately drop its case for Apple to keep the €14.3 billion which is now sitting in an escrow account. We need that money now for tackling the crisis. Second, we need an emergency substantial levy on the wealth of millionaires and billionaires in this country. A 5% levy would raise €8 billion. Third, we need an emergency levy on the reserves of the insurance industry which has disgracefully been seeking to avoid paying out for this crisis when it is precisely moments like this for which small businesses have paid insurance.

People will tell us that dropping the Apple tax case or these levies are not possible. The problem is that these are the same people who told us a one-tier health system was impossible and that the banning of evictions or freezing rents was unconstitutional. When faced with the enormity of this crisis and public pressure to do what is necessary, many of the sacred cows of neoliberalism have been sacrificed in Ireland and around the world. The Minister for Finance said we will never be returning to the old normal. I agree. People will see that if it is possible to ban evictions, to take private hospital beds into the public health system, to pay workers substantially more than the dole now in a time of a crisis, then it should be possible at other times.

We face a crisis right now in terms of Covid-19. We all know, however, that working people, the very people on the front line who are facing this crisis, face crises every single day, crises of rent, cost of living and healthcare. These supports should be made permanent and we will be fighting to make that happen. We will also be demanding that we go further.

The Government is, thankfully, largely attempting to do what the science around coronavirus demands. For decades, scientific experts have also been warning of the existential threat of climate change and to take far-reaching radical measures now to save lives. Just like with the coronavirus, the free market, production for profit, capitalist system is the barrier and at the root of these problems. All the talk of putting capitalism to rest like a sleeping beauty to be re-awoken at some future date by an economist prince is ignoring the reality. Things will not be the same after this crisis. People will fight for the most radical and far-reaching change possible.

We need a set of policies that will restructure society and the economy to focus on the needs of people and our environment, not the desires of billionaires and the super wealthy; a green new deal, with socialist policies, to deal with the economic fall out from this crisis and to prevent the climate crisis; a jobs programme; public ownership; democratic control and planning.

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