Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, Independents 4 Change) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the restoration of the full PUP to €350 a week and the restoration of the wage supplement. This should have been included in the budget but as I noted during the budget debate, it was inevitable that we would move to stricter restrictions very soon. The proposal to tax the PUP is mean, miserly and unnecessary. The last thing workers who have been laid off and whose incomes have been cut need is another debt but that is what is being proposed. The amounts may not be huge but a debt of more than €100 is still a debt. For that reason, I and my colleague from the Independent Group, Deputy Pringle, will be moving an amendment to oppose this measure on Committee Stage. We will be opposing part 1, chapter 3, section 3 of the Bill and we ask other Deputies to support us in that. It is just not necessary to do this, particularly during the situation we are in. It is one thing to introduce measures, but it is another to be able to access the payment, as has been already mentioned.

A significant number of self-employed people have contacted me who have received replies from the Department of Social Protection stating that it does not have any recent record of PRSI contributions paid by them at the relevant classes. They have been without payment since 21 October. That is over two weeks now of waiting for a payment after losing their jobs due to the level 5 restrictions. This has to be dealt with immediately. In another case, an 18-year-old hairdressing apprentice applied for the PUP and was refused even though she got it during the first restrictions in March. I do not know why this is happening. Back in early August when the €250 PUP was brought in a number of people, including people in the arts and entertainment industry and taxi drivers, contacted me because their payments were being reviewed. Many of them were brought down to €203 even though they had sent in their tax certificates and it was very clear they were self-employed and should have received the €350 payment. I made representations for them and sent in the exact same thing to the Department and every single one of the people for whom I sent in representations received the €350. That is a huge number of people to be restored to the €350 payment. Normally when one makes representations for people who have lost payments, one in ten or 20 would be reinstated. When the Government puts in place public policies and supports for workers, those workers should be able to access them easily and not be left without any money for a number of weeks.

The other area where the Government has let down people is that of under-18s who are working but who have not received the PUP, as well as people over 66 who are on pensions. They should be getting a supplementary payment to bring them up if they are due to be on the €250 a week. That has not been dealt with and the Government has let down these people very badly. It is obviously not in this together with them.

The PUP is welcome but the ESRI has stated that 40% of the people who lost their jobs are much worse off now due to financial commitments like mortgages. That was discussed at the Joint Committee on Social Protection, Community and Rural Development and the Islands this morning and it was said that the mortgage interest supplement should be reinstated immediately to support people in this situation. The matter of rent supplement was not raised at the committee meeting but that payment should be also advertised more widely. Many people do not even know they might be entitled to the rent supplement payment.

I am raising these issues because there is no point introducing measures if workers are made jump through hoops to get the payments to which they are entitled. It is bad enough losing one's job but then to be left for weeks without payment is a double-whammy. The PUP and the wage subsidy scheme should remain in place for the duration of the pandemic. The Taoiseach has said publicly that the pandemic mainly affects low-paid workers and he is right about that. Life circumstances do not change for workers whether they are at level 5 or level 1 and the PUP and the wage subsidy payments should remain as they are from here on in.

The 2021 budget, which this Finance Bill will underpin in law, is a response to the exceptional circumstance brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic. The pandemic has exposed serious, fundamental and structural problems in Irish society, particularly the underfunding of essential public services. An opportunity has been lost, not just to dramatically increase the funding available but to carry out fundamental and necessary reforms. As regards Covid, the bulk of extra spending is going to supports for businesses, the wage subsidy scheme and the PUP. These supports are necessary but other areas are also crucial to combatting the pandemic. We need a properly funded and functioning public health service; a functioning test and trace system; to tackle overcrowding by solving the housing crisis; a properly resourced Health and Safety Authority to ensure safety in the workplace; an emergency programme to close down direct provision; and funding to reduce class sizes.

This Bill and the budget fail in these key areas. Despite the extra funding to help the health service, there are significant problems with staff recruitment. The reality is that more funding is required. Are there emergency places opening in colleges for health workers and teachers? I know something was brought in with regard to education yesterday. The testing and tracing has been undermined by a similar failure to recruit the necessary staff. Those staff were being recruited. From what we are hearing, the jobs are not paying well. Their pay and conditions are bad.

On housing, the key to a solution is a commitment to public housing and public land. The €500 million for capital expenditure contrasts sharply with the €2.4 billion for current expenditure by the Department, with €1 billion of that going to landlords for housing assistance payments and rental accommodation scheme payments. There is no commitment to build real public housing to deal with the crisis, and this has been going on for years. We are in the middle of a pandemic and people are in overcrowded circumstances. There is no commitment to build public housing on public land. We know there is sufficient public land to build at least 100,000 mixed tenancy homes, including traditional council housing and cost rental.

Our education system, particularly in primary schools, has suffered from years of chronic underinvestment. Covid is now showing up the lack of basic facilities such as a hot water supply, minimal provision for cleaning, and cramped and overcrowded facilities for learning and play. We have the highest class size in the EU, with one in five pupils having a pupil-teacher ratio of 30:1.

We entered the crisis with almost 700,000 people living below the poverty line, including 225,000 children. The Society of St. Vincent de Paul commissioned a study which shows that a single adult needs a minimum of €249 a week to get by. Leaving core welfare rates at their present level means a continuation of widespread poverty, which will undoubtedly increase as unemployment grows due to Covid-19 restrictions. We are heading towards a 50% jobless rate for workers under 25 years of age. Under-25s make up 11.7% of the labour force but make up 22% of those on the pandemic unemployment payment. A high proportion will have been in part-time, low-paid jobs and are therefore on the lower level of the pandemic unemployment payment. With regard to jobseeker's allowance, 13,000 or 85% of under-25s are on the lowest rate of up to €112 a week. The National Youth Council estimates that a young person living alone in an urban area, taking rent into account, needs €466 for basic needs. Some €112 is a quarter of that, with HAP still short of €190 a week for basics.

This Government had an opportunity with the budget and the Finance Bill to try to address the fundamental issues facing ordinary people in this period and into the future. We know that the ability to borrow at almost 0% interest was an opportunity to begin to address the problems in public healthcare, affordable housing and access to quality education where it matters the most, at primary level, and to tackle unacceptable levels of poverty. It is an opportunity that has been missed.

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