Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for raising this issue, which is a very serious one for many people throughout the country.

We know that inflation has risen very significantly globally. The origins of this are fundamentally global both in terms of oil and gas prices which have risen dramatically across the world - the Deputy will have to acknowledge that - and the unevenness between the supply of products and the demand that rose dramatically as a result of societies and economies reopening and emerging from Covid-19. This is true all across Europe. Ireland has not escaped that global phenomenon of inflation.

In the budget we allocated over €1 billion between tax and social protection measures to help to cushion people in respect of increases in terms of the cost of living, including a €5 increase in the weekly welfare rates; a €5 per week increase in the fuel allowance; a €3 per week increase in the living alone allowance; a €630 million package of income tax and USC reductions and parents' benefits increasing from five to seven weeks from July. In addition to that, the measure we announced last week was for over €500 million, which will result in cutting electricity bills by €200. In regard to the fuel allowance, there is an additional lump sum payment of €125 and the threshold for the drug payment scheme is being reduced from €100 to €80. The Deputy mentioned that Kieran was worried about the cost of medicines and so on. That measure was deliberately targeted at families with significant medical bills. We have reduced that significantly over the past while. There is also a front-loading of the working family payment; a 20% reduction in public transport costs and fares, which will affect and help about 800,000 people who use public transport to get to work and so forth and a reduction in caps for school transport fees for the next academic year.

The Deputy is saying that is too little. Hence, I have to say what she seems to be proposing would be inflationary. The measures the Deputy is advocating would make things worse. On housing, in the budget we have allocated very substantial funds for house construction. We accept that we need to build far more homes and far more apartments than we currently are building. The good news is that throughout 2021 there were 30,000 commencements, the highest since 2008. I would again appeal to Deputies to allow projects to get off the ground. Supply is essential to deal with the housing crisis. Supply is essential to get rents stabilised and reduced. If we do not get up to 33,000 per annum built over the next year number of years, rents will not stabilise and will not come down. People who are objecting left, right and centre to housing developments are not going to help renters. They are not going to help people who are paying too high a rent at this time.

On childcare, the Government is committed to the sector. In the most recent budget, we put a significant allocation of funding towards childcare, to improve the pay and conditions for people working in the childcare sector and to create career pathways. Housing and childcare are two big cost items. We want to go further in the next budget in terms of access and affordability around childcare and we are going to do that. We must also acknowledge that this economy has rebounded very significantly because of good and sound economic management. I am not sure the Deputy acknowledges that. We are near to being back to full employment much earlier than anticipated. Ireland is one of the fastest growing economies across the European Union, with many people securing jobs much earlier after we emerged from the pandemic than would originally have been anticipated. That should be acknowledged as well.

The Government supports in terms of supporting wages, supporting businesses to keep people employed and the pandemic unemployment payment represent unprecedented intervention by Government in the economy over the past two years.

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