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

I will support the amendment. I have been clear in discussions previously about the carbon tax. The way the budget was rolled out today was unfair. It was like a con job. There was VAT, the excise and the extensions on the taxation side. The Minister said there was excise reduction of 21 cent per litre for petrol and 16 cent per litre for diesel. People were texting me and to say, “Thanks be to God”, that there was some relief at the pump because people are feeling the pinch badly. This was one way that the Government could give some relief to everybody. Really, though, the devil is in the detail. They got nothing. The Government gave nothing back to the ordinary mother and father trying to take the child to school in the morning.

I questioned the Minister last week about public transport and he said that if he had the money, he would deliver. Well, he is getting the money from the carbon tax, but he has not delivered in rural Ireland. He is delivering it in the capital and in the surrounds of the capital through pet projects. Yet, rural Ireland is suffering and he has not delivered in my constituency. He said he might do two services before the end of the year. I hope he does, but that is not enough. It is nowhere near enough. We are totally and utterly dependent on the use of vehicles. We would love to have a dream where we could have a kite or something that on which we could all jump on and travel away in the air, but that is not possible. Many Deputies here do not have a clue. They are the Deputies who voted for the carbon tax. They are clueless as to how people survive in rural Ireland.

We even asked the Minister to postpone the carbon tax to give a chance to people during a difficult time, but he still refused to do so. Do not punish the person who has no choice in the matter and who has no public transport.

There is the issue of the farmer who has to use his machines. He cannot just pull up and hope that wind energy will come and drive the tractor. There is also the lorry man who is hauling the food to the shops. The price of food is going up and up and is out of control. The Government cannot control it because fuel is gone out of the price range of the ordinary people. At the very least, the carbon tax should have been postponed to give people a chance. The astonishing thing down my way is that people are paying anything up from €1.85, €1.90, €1.96, €1.97, or €1.98 for 1 l of diesel. That is what we are paying. Today, they felt there would have been some relief, but it was not given. However, it was announced as though something was going to come. There was not one brown cent to the people who are paying for home heating oil, or for the ordinary householders who have little or no other option at this time. Let the options come and the people will move in the right direction, but the options are not there.

The fishermen thought they would be getting some kind of exemption today in relation to fuel, but that did not happen. The Government failed to deliver for the fishermen and for the farmer in relation to fuel and the carbon tax as well as for the people of rural Ireland. I have often said it here that carbon tax is just a tax for pet projects around the capital. The Minister has yet to prove me wrong. Public transport is the way to prove Deputy Michael Collins of Cork South-West wrong. What has the Minister delivered as Minister for Transport in Cork South-West? Zero. There has been zero delivered in public transport in two and a half years. Let those in here who support the carbon tax realise that after two and a half years we have a zero return in Cork South-West. It is a shameful act, and it should not be allowed to continue. People’s heads should roll, and I will be supporting this amendment.

See this speech in context