Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

One thing that constantly disappoints me in the Dáil is how little time we give to deep debate about the Bills, for example, Finance Bills and Social Welfare Bills, which affect people day to day. Unfortunately, this Bill has come in late. It did not go to committee for debate. It is not that the Bill is controversial but we need to have a debate on social welfare. We can appoint all the commissions and experts we want. I would love, however, if we set up a commission of all the people in receipt of social welfare who, in many cases, probably know the system a lot better than anybody else. They would know its ups and downs, crinkles and pitfalls, anomalies and contradictions.

The Minister knows I have strong views on what many people who do not have to actually deal with the system would consider rational policies. I welcome the fulfilment of the commitment to maintain the pension age at 66. We have two choices going forward and I will say this before the commission even reports. We put up the age or we increase the funding that we all make towards our pensions. We do not, by any means, have the highest social security contributions in Europe. The great thing about social security contributions is that they are actually a leveller. One pays according to one's means and one receives according to one's entitlements. These contributions are an income distributor.

What has been left out of this debate is that if one is in a certain type of job, such as our job, one can keep going, almost indefinitely, as long as one's health is good. One is working mainly indoors and doing office work. We see people in these types of job making the choice to continue after 66 and are quite capable of doing it. On the other hand, in the case of those who do physical and manual work, such as block layers and plasterers, by the time they get to 60, they are technically fit for work by the Department's standards but they are not fit for the work that they are trained and capable of doing. When people get to 60, they should be entitled to keep jobseeker's benefit indefinitely. If a person has a chance to get a job, nobody is going to swap €203 for a sum of between €500 and €800. These are people who find it difficult to get jobs. I would not call it jobseeker's benefit, I would call it pre-retirement allowance, as used to be the case. People could claim such an allowance and would not have to be actively seeking work or signing on.

We need significant reform. Unfortunately, in the three and a half minutes I was allocated, I have not been about to contribute much to reform here tonight.

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