Mairead Farrell (Galway West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Politics is about choices. Budgets are about choices. Indeed, a budget literally reflects the different political choices and the different priorities of the Government of the day. Therefore, when people of my age say to me that there is nothing for them here, that there is no chance of them ever owning their own home or that they are not sure what to do about starting a family because they just cannot afford to, it is because of the political choices that the Government has made over years and it is because of the political choices it has made today.

The reality is that this budget was never written with our young people in mind. It was written by a government that is out of touch and it shows. This is certainly no budget for young people and young families. We see no meaningful action to solve the housing crisis, no meaningful action on climate and too little on childcare. This budget says to our young people that once again they are being brought up for export, the mantra of successive Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael governments.

The Tánaiste used to speak about creating a republic of opportunity. It is remarkable that many people now see this as an opportune moment to emigrate. It was never written to keep our young people from emigrating or to give those who have left the opportunity to come home. In some parts of today's presentation, it would appear that the Ministers have spent the weekend rummaging through our wardrobe, stealing our clothes, but unfortunately rather than a fashion upgrade, it appears to be something of a wardrobe malfunction. The outfit they have chosen does not match and they have their shoes on the wrong feet. While I welcome that they have borrowed some of our proposals, unfortunately in some instances they have weakened them, watered them down or simply made them unworkable.

We acknowledge that in recent times the world has suffered several shocks - Covid, inflation, an energy crisis and, of course, war. Individually each of these has been highly significant. Cumulatively they have been even more so. However, we have a cost-of-living crisis which long predates these shocks. Many will watch today to see what decisive action the Government has taken on affordable housing, stopping rent increases and real delivery on childcare costs. The fashion in which taxation and expenditure are deployed helps to test whether the Government's obligations to its citizens are met. These can be new measures used to tackle a new crisis, like the energy crisis that families are facing, or they can be long-standing proposals. Many of the best proposals to tackle the more long-standing problems we face have rarely been given a chance because they are opposed by certain special interests who benefit from the status quo, which has led to the crisis that we now face in housing and healthcare.

A Sinn Féin government would today offer help in the short term to deal with a freezing winter. We would offer certainty in the medium term and hope in the long term that not only could things be better but indeed they would be better. Bhí deis ar leith ag an rialtas inniu, cinnteacht a thabhairt do theaghlaigh agus do ghnólachtaí. Bhí cinnteacht ag teastáil maidir le laghdú ar bhillí leictreachais, i dtaobh praghas cíosa agus i dtaobh tithíochta. Bhí fadhb ollmhór againn le costais maireachtála fiú roimh an gcogadh san Úcráin mar gheall ar chostais arda cúraim leanaí agus tithíochta. Tá mé ag breathnú ar na rudaí atá á dhéanamh leis na costais sin a laghdú sa cháinaisnéis seo agus ní fheicim mórán cinnteachta. Tá sé go maith gur éist an Rialtas linn i dtaobh aigéad a chur ar ais i bpócaí cíosaithe, ach mar a dúirt siad féin, muna mbíonn bac ar ardú ar phraghas cíosa ar feadh trí bliana anuas ar na creidmheasanna, tá baol ann go gcuirfidh sé seo le praghas cíosa mar a chuir an scéim Cabhair le Ceannach le praghas tithíochta; scéim atá le leathnú amach ar feadh dhá bhliain eile.

Tá an rialtas ag caint ar laghdú de 25% ar chostas cúraim leanaí. B’fhéidir gur cinneadh maith a bhí ann é sin a dhéanamh sular thosaigh an boilsciú ach ní leor anois é. Bliain i ndiaidh bliana, feiceann an pobal na geallúintí a dhéanann rialtas de chuid Fhianna Fáil agus Fhine Gael ar lá na gcáinaisnéise ach is minic nach bhfeictear toradh ar na ngeallúintí sin mar nach sroichtear na spriocanna a leagtar amach. Beidh le feiceáil an uair seo.

The cost-of-living crisis families and businesses are facing this winter should be the number one priority for the Minister. Not only should it be the number one priority now, but it should have been for months. The priority should be to provide certainty around energy prices. Crucially, we would provide a cap on the price of electricity. This is needed urgently to provide the kind of certainty that households require. It is the kind of certainty that households in other EU countries will receive. This would return electricity back to its summer 2021 costs. Importantly, we would also bring in a windfall tax. We must decouple gas from electricity prices - something we have long been calling for, but it is something the Government in its infinite wisdom opposed last year. The Government has decided to go down the energy credit route. This will not work. The credit provided could quickly be overtaken by price increases and then hard-pressed families will still be left worrying. They could still be left with an awful choice of having to decide whether to put food on their table or to keep the lights on. This is why our proposal creates greater certainty. This is also why we have proposed an emergency cost-of-living crisis package that recognises the scale of the crisis. This would also include emergency one-off cash payments to middle- and low-income households. This is the kind of certainty that households need, whereby they know exactly what they will be liable for this winter and can plan accordingly.

As the Aire is aware, we have long waited for a real and fundamental change to the cost of childcare. It is now widely accepted that the cost of childcare really is the equivalent of a second mortgage. We know this because families tell us. In Galway, young couples tell me that they are paying as much as €50 a day for childcare services. In Dublin, we know that the average monthly fee is €810. The Minister's proposals will not exactly wow young couples. It pales in comparison to our proposal to reduce fees by two thirds. This would bring the average fee I mentioned to €270. The Government's proposal only reduces it by a quarter. If the Minister had enacted the proposal before the current bout of inflation it might have been seen as a welcome step, but in the current environment it is nowhere near enough. Also, it will not be a major incentive for those young people who are considering emigrating, who have been putting off starting a family because of the high cost. The measure will not stop childcare being a second mortgage. The Minister has slightly reduced the cost of the second mortgage, but a second mortgage is still a second mortgage.

For those parents who have young adults leaving for college for the first time and have had to pay the student contribution charge, which is essentially fees by another name, there is a €1,000 reduction this year, as we have proposed also. This must be the first step towards eliminating fees. We must work towards genuinely free third level education. Next year, people will find their fees going back up. The Aire will have heard of people having to defer their dream course because they cannot find accommodation. A third of those who deferred their course in NUI Galway this year did so because they could not find a place to live. I worry that the accommodation situation is unlikely to get better next year. Indeed, I am concerned that it will get worse. We hear the stories of students. One student from Offaly says he has commuted up to six hours a day to reach UCD from Offaly, and he knows lads who travel from Longford daily. He is weary. He is in final year but he cannot face it and is deferring. Students will be camping out in Eyre Square tomorrow evening to highlight this crisis. I will be joining them. They need delivery on housing.

We see a €12 increase in core social welfare rates. That is inadequate and adds little to an already inadequate social protection scheme. The sum of €12 does not protect from inflation. It does not even come close. It does not protect people from poverty, and it does not recognise the impact of the cost-of-living crisis on those reliant on fixed incomes. The fact that the increases will not be introduced until January beggars belief. I did not believe it when I saw it and heard the Minister say it today. Instead, carers, people with a disability, lone parents and older people will wait for another four months for weekly increases. These are the households that are already living in poverty and making choices between putting food on the table and turning on the lights, yet the message is that their weekly fixed income will not change until January, despite them currently living in a frighteningly fluid situation. This is why we called for an immediate €15 increase, rising to €17.50 next year for working-age payments and pensioners living alone, and €20 per weekly disability payments.

Every year, some things stand out in budgets. I will never forget sitting here last year listening to the two Airí across from me announcing measure after measure, only to realise that once again they had forgotten the renters of this country. There was not a mention of them. Renters were left baffled and astonished that the Government had taken no action to alleviate the great pressure they were under. I will never forget that their initial proposals for renters was that they had decided to link rent to the rate of inflation, which was obviously a very bright idea at the time. Thankfully, due to the fact that most people saw that this was nonsensical, there was a U-turn on that one. Let us imagine where renters would now be if that had happened. For them, the cost-of-living crisis was well under way this time last year. We already had some of the highest rents in Europe, but all of that was ignored.

Renters need certainty and that is what Sinn Féin will bring them. We would cap and reduce rents. We would put one month's back in renters' pockets and we would ban rent increases for three years. It does seem the Minister has finally seen the light on this one and sought to introduce this measure, which we have been proposing for several years. Unfortunately, in the Government's characteristic style, it has failed to grasp how the measure should be implemented, although the Minister did point it out to us when we raised it. However, he has not taken the appropriate steps to ensure that it will not be inflationary. He has taken a solid Sinn Féin proposal but then watered it down. To be clear, the renter's credit might have been a month's rent a decade ago, but for many it is not even a fortnight's rent. Perhaps that is the problem - the Government does not know what people are going through in the here and now. The most glaring omission is a failure to instigate a ban on rent increases, as we have been calling for. Introducing a credit without a cap will be inflationary and as the Minister told us, it will cause rents to rise. He even recognised it. His failure to ban rent increases means that no sooner will this money enter the pockets of renters than it will have gone back out and into the pockets of landlords.

How could the Minister get it so wrong? I suppose that should not be a surprise, as the Government has been getting it wrong on housing for years. It is what the President, Michael D. Higgins, aptly described as "our great, great failure". To be more precise, it is the Minister's great, great failure, although it could perhaps be his great, great achievement. It must be listed as an achievement that in just over a decade he managed to push house prices back above Celtic tiger levels. There is a saying that something always seems impossible until it is done. My God, how the Minister has done it. We already had the highest property prices in the EU and the Minister is hell-bent on keeping it that way. This has locked so many out of home ownership. People are trapped in a rental cycle where rents consume more and more, possibly even much more than a third of people's income. After people have covered all their other expenses, there's little left to save for a deposit. Compounding this problem is the fact that rents keep on rising. The cost of renting in Ireland rose 76.7% between 2010 and 2022. People are forced to chase a moving target. While people are running and trying to keep up with rents, a speed bump of any size can throw them off the track and result in homelessness. The Ministers must know themselves that the housing situation is getting worse. They must hear about it in their clinics and offices and get stopped in the streets by people trying to help families on the brink of homelessness, with the answer continuously coming back that nothing can be done. It came as a surprise to us all when earlier this year the Tánaiste said perhaps it was time Fine Gael had another go at housing. I ask, seriously, what more damage the party could do. We know what Fine Gael does when it comes to housing. Whereas Fianna Fáil follows the dreams of the developers, Fine Gael follows the dreams of the investment funds. That is who has been the inspiration for the housing policies. It was bad enough that the funds were buying up so much of the stock of new homes but now we are learning that they are buying up huge amounts of second-hand properties. On Sunday, the Business Postrevealed that institutional investors and real estate firms spent approximately €1 billion buying second-hand homes last year. This equated to approximately 4,500 properties in a section of the market typically targeted by first-time buyers. Again, this week we saw The Ditchreveal that a fund backed by the Singaporean Government spent €300 million since 2019 and it bought more than 850 second-hand homes. As bad as the housing situation is, this is another indication that it is set to get worse still. Second-hand homes can be cheaper than new builds. They are often the only way most first-time buyers can enter home ownership. Once again, it seems that the investment funds are closing off that avenue too. Last year, the Taoiseach said the levy on investment funds would mean the entities could not compete with first-time buyers. We told the Minister that the levy he was introducing on the bulk purchase of new homes was not enough.

We told the Government the exemptions on apartment blocks would make it unworkable, but again it dismissed us, claiming it was mere populism on our part. Once again, however, not only are they still bulk-buying new homes but they are now making large purchases of second-hand homes too. We have heard about landlords fleeing the market and we are seeing that smaller landlords are fleeing. Accidental landlords who had buy-to-lets that were previously in negative equity are leaving, but who is stepping into their place? Investment funds. For God's sake; how bad will it have to get before the Government realises these investment funds are a blight on our society?

Then we come to Housing for All, the big plan for supply, supply, supply. The targets for the delivery of social and affordable homes were seriously lacking in ambition to begin with, but even those lowly targets keep being missed and I can bring the Ministers to Galway to show them that. Let us recall the recent census figures showing thousands of vacant homes in this State. We hear the Minister, Deputy Donohoe, is bringing in a vacant property tax, so cheers to that, but the time to have done this was long ago. When it comes to housing, the choice is clear. Do we want a housing system where a house is a home, somewhere to raise young children, to grow old and to make fond memories, or do we want our housing system to be an asset class, filled with odd-sounding acronyms for different investment vehicles, which I will list and get wrong, such as IREFs, ICAVs, CIFs and CCFs. The Government has committed to reviewing some of these, but what is there to review? I could go on but we get the picture. The choice is clear. Do we want housing based on human need or a financial asset class based on speculative greed?

When it comes to our health system, the sad reality is it is neither healthy nor a system. In some ways, it mirrors the housing crisis; both are a failure in planning and a failed ideology that has damaged public services. It is not working for those who need it. Waiting lists continue to grow while people wait in their thousands for medical care. The trolley crisis continues to get worse and again, on Friday, 69 people were on trolleys in University Hospital Galway, something we honestly thought would not happen again post Covid. The health system is also not working for the hard-pressed healthcare professionals toiling night and day to try to keep the show on the road, which is why Sinn Féin would deliver a national health service over the space of ten years. We would place dignity, respect and fairness at the heart of healthcare and labour relations, and we are not in the business of making promises we cannot keep. The Government has spent only an additional €20 million on disability, whereas we have provided for €152 million, and that is appalling. It outlined just an additional €14 million for mental health, which is shocking, while we have provided for €81 million because that is what is needed.

As I said, we do not make promises we cannot keep and any of the measures we have announced are based on realistic, deliverable targets. We have seen on multiple occasions the Government make health-related announcements that are not delivered. Its GP announcement sounds good, but when GPs woke up this morning, it was news to them. We all heard the GP on the radio this morning stating he had no idea how his fellow GPs will cope if the Government’s proposed measure goes ahead. I hope this is not the Government looking for praise in the absence of proper preparation because we recall the promise to deliver free GP care to all children up to 12, which was legislated for three years ago and never happened. Big announcements without planning are doomed to fail, as we saw in the case of staffing and beds. In budget 2021 and in last year's winter plan, just over 1,200 beds were provided for, a quarter of which have been funded but not yet delivered. The Minister could not deliver what he had funded because there is not a plan. The increase announced today for acute services equates to less than one-tenth of the increase for our hospitals. The figure is so low it has left me wondering whether it is true. There is not a red cent for a new hospital bed; it seems the Government has no plan for that either. I just hope the expanded free GP care will not go the same way because a lot of people have heard about it today and are hoping they will get the support.

It is a case of rising expectations but falling standards. Workforce planning in our healthcare system is key and has too often been neglected. We would tackle the issue of capacity and we recently published a substantial document that sets out a roadmap that would bring us from the current situation of long waiting lists to quicker turnaround times, from poor system capacity and an overworked, underappreciated workforce to a properly functioning system, where healthcare workers are given the dignity, the respect and the pride of place they deserve. Sláintecare is nominally supported by every party in this House but, in effect, the parties on the Government benches have not shown any intention of getting us there. We need a national health service. We need to end the two-tier system. We need healthcare just as we need housing, as a basic human right.

The other key issue of our day, which both Ministers mentioned, relates to climate. I find it funny when people say we in Sinn Féin are weak on climate, but it is weak criticism when it comes from Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, Government parties that have presided over one of the worst performing countries in terms of meeting emissions reduction targets. Targets are missed and we do not appear to be making much progress, and the Government's big solution, the carbon tax, has done nothing to change behaviour. As we have told it countless times, and as I know as someone who represents a rural constituency, tax can change behaviour only when there is an affordable alternative to which people can change, so we should not cut bus services. Let us think about this for a moment. The plan was to increase the price of carbon, thinking everyone would run out and buy expensive electric vehicles, but the energy crisis has pushed the price of carbon far higher than the carbon tax ever did. I know that the people coming to my clinics, and I am sure the people who go to the Ministers' clinics, have not been magically able to afford electric vehicles, which often start at €40,000.

In fact, they cannot even afford to retrofit their house. We need a fairer retrofit scheme that will lift people out of energy poverty while reducing emissions. A lot of families are locked out of the retrofit scheme because they do not meet the criteria for a free energy upgrade under the warmer homes scheme, nor do they have the cash reserves to afford a deep retrofit under the one-stop shop scheme. Not only have we provided about €100 million more than the Government has for retrofits but we would completely overhaul the system. We would establish a new retrofit scheme for middle and low-income households, with area-based components. If all our funding were for deep retrofits, it would deliver approximately 6,000 deep retrofits for those who are currently locked out. Under this scheme, households earning up to €75,000 would be entitled to different levels of funding, from between 100% to 60% of the cost of deep retrofits, depending on household income. Our second new retrofit scheme would be for solid-fuel households. A total of 10% of households rely on solid fuels, mainly in our rural areas, and theirs tend to be the poorest, coldest and most carbon-intensive homes. We need a targeted scheme for these families.

Our final scheme would be based on tiered retrofit support for higher income households. This would reform the current one-stop shop scheme, which provides the same level of funding for deep retrofits irrespective of means. Under our reformed scheme, we would provide different levels of support ranging from 55% to 5%, with a cap on incomes of more than €130,000. We believe that if we want to protect against fuel poverty, to improve the energy efficiency of our housing stock and to make serious inroads in our climate targets, these schemes are necessary. As it stands, many households need €25,000 in cash before such a course of action can even be considered, and this locks many middle and low-income families out of the equation.

Our budget has also made significant provisions for accelerating the transition to renewable energy and this is through investment and the proper resourcing of the planning system to speed up the development of offshore wind generation. We have heard plenty of times that Ireland can become a leader in wind energy and we would like to see this dream realised. We too would provide for solar panels for schools and we have the legislation ready to go to alleviate the planning issues, so the Government should talk to my colleagues Deputies O'Rourke and Ó Laoghaire about that one. Families also want the opportunity to put solar panels on their roofs, as we all hear about in our housing estates, and we would provide grants for that. Unlike the Government’s approach, which provides the same level of grant for all households, our scheme would provide different levels of funding, ranging from 100% to 10%, again depending on household income, thereby improving affordability for solar PV for those who would benefit the most from lower bills.

We need to make public transport affordable and more accessible if we are serious about driving down emissions, and that includes people in rural Ireland. They need sustainable transport options including rural bus services and rail such as the western rail corridor. Perhaps it is not Elon Musk driving a Tesla, but it is what rural Ireland badly needs. We would also like to see serious polluters, such as private jets, pay a €3,000 pollution levy per departure. We need to be ambitious in our climate targets and we need to deliver on them. Sinn Féin is proposing climate-action measures that will both improve people's lives and reduce carbon emissions.

The times are changing. The people gathered in their thousands last weekend to say that enough is enough. They can see a better and brighter future ahead. People will again gather in their thousands this weekend to reimagine the Ireland in which we live and to consider a new Ireland that will put citizens at the centre of decision-making - a united Ireland.

I told the Ministers for Finance and Public Expenditure and Reform this time last year that the conversations on a new Ireland had already begun; they were happening in all parts of our communities and were only gaining momentum. I will tell the Ministers again. The people are in front of the Government on the issue of the constitutional future of this island. While the Government dithers and delays, the people are leading out in front. The Government has the opportunity to bring this forward. It can decisively set out the next steps on the road to an Irish unity referendum.

Unity is the big idea of our time. There will be a unity referendum. There is no "if"; the only question is "when". The Government should join us in the conversation. It should make space for everyone to be involved and lead out in front by the establishment of a citizens' assembly.

Mar fhocal scoir, we have heard of"No Country for Old Men", but this has become no country for young people. We know this because they are literally telling us. This is why 70% of 18 to 24-year-olds are considering emigrating. They see a brighter future for themselves in faraway places like Australia and Canada. When I look at today's budget, I am disappointed for our young people. What is in it for them? The Government's tax proposals will benefit less than one quarter of taxpayers. It is failing to meet its housing delivery targets and its housing policies are inflationary. The rent credit will be gobbled up by rent increases because the Government failed to introduce a rent freeze. Let me say to those young people who are watching today with growing frustration that we hear them. We see that the Ministers sitting in front of us have passed their sell-by date. We know that together we can build a far brighter future for all of us, and that our society will only truly flourish when young people can call this place home.

A new republic is waiting to be born and it is already being imagined. It gets closer every day. This will be a new republic where equality, fairness, justice and unity are not just words that Government Deputies say because their public relations advisers think they make for a nice sound bite, but where these words are living, breathing ideals upon which a new republic will be built.

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