Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

My point is that the real democracy was happening out on the streets of Dublin on Saturday when 20,000 people came out in what was one of the biggest demonstrations we have seen in recent years with workers, students, pensioners, people with disabilities, and people from all over the country. They are sick of this Government, sick of the spin and sick of the propaganda, when they know the reality is that they are facing an utterly disastrous cost-of-living and housing crisis. They did not believe for one minute that this Government was serious about addressing it. When one looks beyond the spin, and when the dust settles, it will be absolutely clear to all of those people and to the many more who marched at the weekend that they need to get out on the streets again. Plans are already under way for the next national demonstration about the cost-of-living and the housing crisis on 12 November. I confidently predict that it will be bigger again than the protests we saw on Saturday.

It is clear that the Government is interested in spin. What we actually got in this budget was not a giveaway and not a bonanza, except maybe for the big corporations, the energy companies and the wealthy. For the ordinary people we got a few sticking plasters on the gaping wound that is the housing and homelessness crisis, and on the cost-of-living crisis. Those sticking plasters will not stop the bleeding, the hardship, and the suffering as a result of the cost-of-living and housing crisis that blights the lives of tens of thousands of working people, of pensioners, of students and of the vulnerable in our society.

The net fact about this budget, when one unravels the spin, is that the vast majority of people will be worse off in the next year than they were last year. That is the reality. Consider the €12 increase in pensions and social welfare payments against what would be necessary to protect people just against the rising costs of living, and based on the real level of inflation, which is about €27 per week. This would not be gaining anything, it would be not to lose and not be driven further into poverty. The Government has given less than half of what is necessary to protect the most vulnerable people, our older people, our people with disabilities, our social welfare recipients and many working people from being driven further into poverty because of the profiteering of energy companies and others who are benefiting and exploiting the cost-of-living crisis. That is the reality.

As I pointed out in a pre-budget debate, the Central Statistics Office, CSO, estimates that in order not to live in poverty a person needs some €287 per week. This means that anybody who is solely dependent on the State pension or a State welfare payment is, by definition, living in poverty. This Government should, particularly against the background of this cost-of-living and housing crisis, at the very minimum have lifted the most vulnerable people out of poverty, but it has not. When taken in the round, the people who needed help are going to be worse off next year than they were this year.

Take for example, a fairly average worker earning between €25,000 and €30,000. In the Government's own budget book this worker would gain an extra €4 per week. This is against a background where, in real terms, energy bills will most likely have trebled by the end of this year. Along with the costs of basic goods such as milk, bread, food items and so on, and with increases in rent and other costs of living, one estimate is that a worker will have lost between €4,000 and €5,000 as a result of the cost-of-living crisis. They will get €4 extra as a result of the tax changes that the Government has made.

Even if a person is earning slightly more at €40,000 or a little bit more, a person will receive an extra €16 per week. This is a total drop in the ocean compared to the crucifying increases in the cost of living, the rise in energy costs, the cost of heating one's home, the cost of paying the rent, the cost of paying for childcare, the cost of paying fees, and all of the other increases in costs that are crucifying people. The truth of this will become apparent. In the end, the Government cannot hide the reality of what is actually in people's pockets with a few once-off payments. The Government has changed the arithmetic over the weekend, probably in response to the scale of the protest. Some of the once-off payments that we had heard about increased, literally, over the weekend.

The protest put them under pressure and they were forced to increase the once-off payments they will give in the months before Christmas because they suddenly understood the scale of the anger, frustration and hardship when they saw those people on the streets but people will not be fooled by one-off payments. The problem is that the Government failed, and is not willing as a government, to deal with the underlying problem and root cause of the cost of living and housing crisis which is rampant profiteering of energy companies, corporate landlords and big corporations. It does not want to address that so many of the billions of euro that it will give out in once-off payments will go into the pockets of people and straight out again into the coffers of the energy companies. On top of that, some of the big winners will also get new subsidies. The energy supports that are being given for business are significantly higher than the proportion that is being given to ordinary householders and from what I can see, unless the Minister contradicts me, there is no threshold or limit on the amount of profits that can be made from the business recipients of the energy supports. Surely data centres, for example, should be excluded from the energy supports when they are sucking massive amounts out of the energy system. If they can claim that their energy costs have increased, they will get more subsidies when they are part of the problem in terms of the energy price hikes we are suffering.

There is some increase in the number of people entitled to the fuel allowance, and I welcome that, but huge numbers will not be. Some 80,000 more people will be eligible but any reasonable estimate of those suffering energy poverty would have required eligibility for the fuel allowance to increase by at least 300,000 people. For example, pensioners who have a little bit of an extra pension as well as the State pension are excluded from fuel allowance. From the figures here, it looks like they will not benefit and many others who also need the ongoing help of fuel allowance will not get that support.

Windfall tax is a promise but there is no actual windfall tax on the energy companies. The Government is waiting for Europe to maybe figure it out and it can introduce it some time in the future but here and now there is no windfall tax on the super profits being enjoyed by the energy companies and no caps on the charges and massive price hikes they are inflicting on people. It will continue to let energy companies that have seen record profits spike over the last year to continue to profiteer at the expense of ordinary people. Quite frankly, it is nauseating. What was necessary was to cap the prices they are charging people for heating and electricity in their homes and to take the sector under public control and run it on a not-for-profit basis. What we are witnessing is spectacular profiteering and market failure of the privatised market in energy.

Then there is housing. I just cannot believe what has happened in housing. You get the real budget when you look at the Estimates book. If you listened to the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Michael McGrath's speech you would think there were huge additional resources and all sorts of new measures to deal with what is an absolute housing catastrophe but then you go and look at the Estimates book. The actual money allocated is exactly the same as last year: €3.6 billion in 2022 and €3.6 billion in 2023. It is the same. Oh my God. How could you possibly allocate the same money as you allocated last year to deal with a housing crisis that has got exponentially worse when the Government's own plan has failed to meet its targets, when homelessness has increased by 30%, when rents have gone up more and more? It is absolutely unbelievable. There is a slight increase in the money going to the homeless but it is only 10% when the number of people who are actually homeless has gone up by 30%. That means more misery for families that are being evicted at the moment and we are seeing a major spike in families being evicted because they cannot afford the rents that are being charged. The HAP limits being given to support them are too low. And I really want to highlight a critical point that no one has mentioned yet. Due to the Government's failure for years to raise the social housing income thresholds, we have seen the culling of thousands and thousands of working people from the social housing list and that is going to get worse after the budget because the people who got some increases as a result of the adjustment of the bands will now see very slight increases in their net take-home pay and as a result they will be thrown off the housing list and denied eligibility for social housing. It will worsen the situation for many people. People were phoning me up this week saying they hoped they did not get any additional money from the Government in the budget because they would be thrown off the housing list. That is the truth. That is a massive stealth cut that the Government has been perpetrating for several years. A few years ago 47% of households were entitled to social housing or social housing support and now it is down to 33%. That will be further reduced but the Government refuses to even publish the review on the social housing income threshold that has been on its desk since the end of December 2021. It is a review that has been going on for about five years.

The vacant homes tax is just a joke. It is three times the level of the property tax and property speculators sitting on empty or derelict properties will not even be included in the vacant homes tax. There is a whole series of derogations for empty homes. Even if they are identified as vacant homes that are vacant without good reason it will be around €1,000 a year on average. That is not going to make any difference to these vulture funds or investment funds which are sitting on property watching its value clock up. They do not give a damn because they are making far more on the capital gain of that property rising in value. Unless they can make super profits, they have no intention of renting it out to the people who really need assistance in the housing crisis.

There is nothing in the budget for those affected by defective housing and the failure in building standards and fire control standards. For tens of thousands of people facing enormous costs who are simply unable to remedy their houses that were built during the Celtic tiger because of the costs involved there is nothing at all in the budget. The concrete levy that the Government celebrated in speeches earlier will simply add to the already unaffordable cost of housing.

The rent credit is just pathetic. A €500 tax credit for some renters but if you are in receipt of HAP, you do not get the credit even though you are paying top-up rent payments. Everyone in my area who is in receipt of HAP is paying a top-up over and above the differential rent. A working family was in with me the other day who are paying a €1,000 top-up as well as the €200 it is paying to the council; they will not get the renters' tax credit. That is how much they pay a month, by the way, when the renters tax credit is €500 over the course of the whole year. People are paying rents of €2,000 and €2,500 a month from these racketeering corporate landlords.

There are a few other things that have not come out or that at least need to be clarified. The Estimates book is a good book to read. That is where you get the detail. Incredibly the environment, climate and communications budget has been cut by 17% and the Green Party has allowed this to happen. It is quite extraordinary. People should look at the Estimates book. The expenditure report shows a 17% cut in the environment, climate and communications portfolio. Since we put this out I have seen the Department tweet that this is not true but it is here in front of me: the budget for energy transformation is down by 35%.

That is the main line item that is down. The total expenditure adjustment for the Department is down by 17% in the Estimates book. If the Minister has it there, he might have a look at it because if he does not know about that he really should.

It is absolutely shocking the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media has also seen an 8% cut in its allocation. Although some bodies under its remit will see some minor increases in funding, people in the music and entertainment sector have been texting me over the last hour or two saying there is nothing for them. Despite lobbying and despite producing a very good pre-budget submission, which apparently got cross-party support from Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and so on, in actuality there is nothing for that sector and the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media got an 8% cut in the in the overall budget.

We have seen only a 2% increase in the transport budget which is really pathetic. If we are serious about cutting the cost of living and simultaneously trying to address climate change by encouraging people to make greater use of public transport, we needed a dramatic cut in if not the abolition of fares, but we also needed massive capital investment for the expansion of the bus fleet and public transport infrastructure to accommodate more people. We have a miserable, derisory 2% increase in the budget.

In the area of health, we have a 5.8% increase in the overall allocation but that is significantly less than the level of inflation. The big issues in our health service are the waiting lists the catastrophe of accident and emergency departments all linked critically to the issue of recruitment and retention of staff. We need to consider the inability of the health service to recruit and retain the nurses and all the other allied health professionals necessary to provide a decent healthcare system. We have a system that is failing people disastrously because of the lack of resources and staff, and yet we get an increase below the inflation level in the budget for the health service.

Let us consider the plan to deal with waiting lists. Last year €350 million was allocated to deal with the waiting lists and the consultants are now saying that that plan which was supposed to reduce waiting lists by 132,000 will actually result at the end of this year in 20,000 more on waiting lists than there were at the beginning of this year. Therefore, the small increase in the health budget is destined not to address that waiting list scandal where huge numbers of people who are sick and need surgery and other treatments are on waiting lists for years and years.

On education, we welcome primary schoolbooks being free, something we have been proposing for many years. However, it is only for primary school but not for secondary school when the costs for secondary schoolbooks and other items are very considerable. There is no funding to provide free books for secondary school students. While the Government has reduced the student-staff ratio somewhat, what will that do to deal with the inability to recruit and retain teachers particularly in Dublin which in turn is linked to the Government's failure to address the housing crisis? Teachers do not want to work in Dublin and the big urban centres because they cannot afford the rents or the house prices. Therefore, they are not willing to work in our schools. Where will the Government get the teachers if it fails, as it has done, to deal with the housing crisis?

While there is a €500 reduction in higher education fees, people are still paying €2,500 in fees. In reality there should be no fees whatsoever for access to higher education. While students will continue to pay them, many people cannot even stay in college and are now deferring or giving up the places in college because they cannot afford the accommodation costs in Dublin and the major urban centres. All student unions are reporting that record numbers of students are not taking up their places because they cannot afford the cost of accommodation and the Government has failed to provide affordable student accommodation for our students.

The Minister mentioned an increase in the PhD stipend but it is absolutely pathetic. An extra €500 a year for those PhD and research students who get a stipend - many do not - brings it up to €19,000 but is still below the level of the minimum wage. We need people doing PhD and research studies. The Government always talks about an innovation economy and how we need more skilled and trained people. However, for the huge numbers of people doing doctorates, PhDs, postgraduate courses and so on who are living in absolute poverty, this will not do anything other than scratch the surface. It is not even that; it is cosmetic and will make no difference to the poverty that many of those research and PhD students are suffering.

My last points relate to the big elephant in the room in all of this. As I mentioned earlier, single earners earning between €25,000 and €35,000 will get €4 extra per week against the background of an absolutely catastrophic cost-of-living crisis. They have lost about €4,000 or €5,000 in real terms. It barely scratches the surface. However, the tax breaks for the super-wealthy executives will continue. The special assignee relief programme, a tax break given only to people who earn more than €100,000, will continue. Super-wealthy executives not remotely affected by the housing crisis or the cost-of-living crisis will get a special tax break all of their own. It is absolutely obscene.

That speaks to a far more general giveaway in what I like to call the shadow budget, the budget that is never really talked about, the tax breaks for the big corporations and the rich which are absolutely extraordinary. We have heard that there has been a €5 billion bounce in corporation tax receipts in the last year. That can only happen if there is a massive increase in the level of corporate profits. Between 2012 and 2020 corporate profits went from €74 billion to €193 billion. However, based on the corporation tax receipts for 2021 and 2022, there may have been an increase of as much as 25% to 30% in corporate profits in this country. They are absolutely creaming it, but the Government does not want to take any extra money from these people.

It does not want to take any extra money from the real estate investment trusts which, according to the Government's own figures, have seen their profits treble in the last four years from €7 billion to €20 billion. It does not want to raise any additional tax revenue from landlords who own multiple properties. There is no increase in the taxes on those people.

The list of other corporate tax breaks in Revenue's tables is absolutely incredible. There is a tax loophole - if you want - in the Revenue tables which is called intragroup transactions. This is where the big corporations shift money from one subsidiary they own to another subsidiary. In 2019, €16 billion in tax relief was given to subsidiaries shifting profits from one subsidiary to another. In 2020, that figure went to €35 billion. It is eye-watering stuff and we do not know what it is for 2021 and 2022.

That is the real budget behind the spin.

The real budget is that this Government protects the profiteers in the energy companies, the big multinational corporations, the property investors and vulture funds while ordinary people are crucified, but it tries to hypnotise them with a few sprinkles of dust, which in reality are just a few thimblefuls of water thrown at a raging fire of a housing and cost-of-living crisis that is gobbling up the income of working people who are seriously struggling to deal with it. The people will not be fooled. They will be back out on the streets in a few weeks when the dust has settled and the spin has stopped. The harsh reality is that despite record revenues being available to the Government to address the cost-of-living crisis and the housing crisis, and the fact that we had a report this week showing we are the third richest country in the world - is that not amazing - we have one of the worst housing crises in Europe. We have the highest cost of living pretty much anywhere in Europe and we are the third richest country, but the vast majority of ordinary people are suffering because the priorities of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and, tragically, the Green Party, are to protect the winners from this crisis and inflict all the hardship and misery on working people, students, pensioners and the vulnerable in society.

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