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

I saw yesterday how the Government was in celebratory mode. It was celebrating that Ireland has the fastest growing GDP in all the EU. I am sure this news must have come as great comfort for all of those currently struggling to pay their bills. I am sure all those anxiously waiting for the eviction ban to be lifted must have slept a little easier last night. I am sure spontaneous street parties broke out among the 11,000 citizens who are homeless. In the mind of this Government, the boom times are getting even boomier. I am sorry to burst the Minister's bubble but nobody outside of this out-of-touch Government would embarrass themselves by cheering about our headline GDP numbers at a time like this. Maybe Fine Gael has forgotten about the phenomenon known as "leprechaun economics", but the rest of the State has not. Here in the real world, we have families who have to go without certain daily necessities like heat, food and electricity. We have people on low and fixed incomes who have been pushed to the pin of their collar because of inflation. We have renters terrified that the eviction ban is ending and they cannot find alternative accommodation because - guess what? - the Government has not supplied the required housing.

That is why we would introduce a spring bonus for those on working-age payments, including lone parents, pensioners and people with disabilities. We would extend fuel allowance eligibility to working family payment recipients to reach families who are in work but are on very low incomes. We would extend the eviction ban so that those who are currently terrified of losing their homes can sleep a bit easier. We would also grant relief to those whose mortgage costs have exploded with the recent ECB interest rate increases.

We know that the Government can help those who are struggling. It cannot in one breath tell us how well the economy is performing and then in another, tell us the funds are not there to support very vulnerable people who are being pushed to the pin of their collar because we are talking about real lives. Sometimes we get caught up in statistics but these are people who are really struggling and hurting.

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