Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The only thing that is extraordinary is the Taoiseach's extraordinary lack of fairness and his even more extraordinary lack of self-awareness in this regard. Let us rehearse the facts again. The Government's new wage subsidy scheme excludes 153,000 workers who earn €151 a week, or less. They are not eligible and are excluded from the scheme. That hurts those workers, it hurts their employers and the Government has left them out in the cold, very deliberately. That is a fact. The Government has also cut the PUP, so another 150,000 or more workers are down €50 or €100 a week. That is also a fact. That hurts those workers and their families, and now we have a Low Pay Commission that is not minded to deal in any acceptable way with the issue of low pay.

Does the Taoiseach, therefore, agree with ICTU that the minimum increase to the minimum wage ought to be 20 cent an hour or more? Will he move beyond his sort of delusional reverie and into the real world with us, address those low-paid workers excluded from the Government's wage subsidy scheme and those who will be hurt by the changes to PUP? Will the Taoiseach tell those workers how he is going to correct for those very bad decisions?

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