Michael Collins (Cork South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Last week's announcement by the Government of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Green Party showed that it is alarmingly out of touch with people in this country. It is astonishing to think the Government could go ahead with so-called cuts to help people and still be so blind to the real crisis whereby we see working families in such a mess. People cannot pay their rent and are struggling to pay their mortgages. Others are struggling to put food on the table. Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Green Party have left most families with a clear choice each day between opting for either food or heat.

The Government, with Sinn Féin, Labour and others, voted to bring in the carbon tax only a few months ago, even though the Rural Independent Group pleaded with them not to. Boy, what a mess they have created for ordinary families who are trying to work their way out of the crisis we are in at the moment with no help from a struggling Government. Two hundred euro off an electricity bill is as much as most families will get. The rest is tied up in a dream announcement that will have little to do with the ordinary families that I know.

The 20% reduction in public transport fares will suit the Green Party to perfection because those who use the DART, the train and Luas in Dublin city and its surrounds will benefit the most, as will anyone who uses Bus Éireann's services. Private bus operators do not receive any State intervention. They employ people who drive buses the length and breadth of this island - many of them from west Cork to Cork city daily. These operators will not get one brown cent from the 20% reduction. For many of them, this will mean laying off staff because this blind Government is giving an already subsidised bus service 20% more in subsidies and the private bus operator will get nothing. Surely the competition regulator has to get involved. To be honest, if they were all asleep, you could not write up this stuff. People who are paying massive rents, businesspeople with lorries and buses and contractors cannot wait to drag the Government to the ballot box as soon as possible in order to get rid of it.

I will just add that people who cannot get on the property ladder for one reason or another feel rightly let down after last week's announcements.

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