Duncan Smith (Dublin Fingal, Labour) | Oireachtas source

As the Minister for Justice and Equality is in the Chamber, I would like to start by welcoming the €3 billion increase in funding for the justice portfolio. The Minister has said she looks forward to dedicating some of those resources to tackling domestic, sexual and gender-based violence. I look forward to getting more information in the coming days and weeks on how the Minister intends to apply those resources to that need. The allocation of new gardaí is most welcome.

There is no denying that there are many good things in this budget. I have been contacted by people involved in youth services who very much welcome the increase in funding in that area. That sector ran a very positive campaign through the National Youth Council of Ireland, which the Labour Party supported. Youth services have received an increase in funding. There is an expectation that it will go to front-line youth services. I have no doubt that this will be the case.

Turning to transport, which is my own portfolio, commitments have been made with regard to MetroLink, the DART extension programme and BusConnects. These are all welcome. I will not say much about the money because an awful lot of it had already been allocated. However, there have been commitments to apply for railway orders for the major projects within the calendar year of 2021. We have to hold the Government to account in that regard. Those are political rather than financial commitments, but they are important. They are part of this package. This budget will not affect people's household finances. Its effect will be through these big projects, which will require investment. We will need to see progress on them.

There is a gap here where the promotion of active travel is concerned. This budget should have enabled people with disabilities to get around their own villages, towns and communities. I hope that in the coming days and weeks the Minister for Transport will revisit this. Perhaps we can allocate resources to that area. We all know that we need to connect our major cities and allow people to get from one end of the country to the other. However, people throughout our State are unable to get from their front door to their local shop, which may only be 400 yd away. Addressing that is just as important as investing in major projects like MetroLink.

There are gaps in this budget which we in the Labour Party would like to see filled. The aviation sector has been spoken about many times in this Chamber and in hearings of the Oireachtas Special Committee on Covid-19 Response. The sector directly and indirectly supports 140,000 jobs and drives the country's economy. There are massive opportunities for the State to rescue the aviation industry, set it on the path to becoming more carbon-friendly and protect its workers. Sadly those measures are absent from this budget.

There is also nothing for early years educators. I know the general election seems like a very long time ago, but it was only in February. The largest demonstration we saw in that period was the march of 30,000 childcare workers and early years educators through Dublin. That was a powerful and positive campaign. Those workers have been left out of this budget. That is something this Government will need to address.

Regarding climate action, I note that the national home retrofitting scheme could have been more ambitious. This could have been a really ambitious scheme that put the idea of a just transition into practice. An allocation has been made, but it is not ambitious enough. In our alternative budget the Labour Party costed the retrofitting of 100,000 homes. Our previous alternative budgets outlined a plan for street-by-street home retrofitting. This would involve retraining workers in fossil fuel industries for high-skilled and well-paid jobs that would reduce our carbon footprint. If there is any low-hanging fruit in climate action it is in the retrofitting of our homes. They emit 60% more carbon than the EU average. We need a strong plan to tackle that, and this budget does not quite achieve that. I am not saying this just to pick holes. The measures in the budget could have been better. They could have been worker-focused and properly green, and made real progress on carbon emissions and climate action.

I would like to say a final word on arts. Money has been allocated to the arts. The arts community has run an incredible campaign for its very survival throughout this pandemic. It has been positive and engaged. It has brought home the extent to which the arts enrich us. They are so integral to our life in Ireland. Many people in the arts are welcoming that funding. They will see it in their pockets and it will help them to survive.

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