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

-----on the commitment to do so. People Before Profit has been very consistent in its view on the USC since entering this Dáil in 2011, which is that it was a grossly unfair austerity imposition on working people to pay for the crimes of the bankers and property developers who put this country over a cliff in 2008. Workers got it in the neck and were asked to pay for the crimes of others but it was supposed to be a temporary austerity measure. Workers were promised that it would go when the crisis had passed but that promise has been reneged upon. Anybody who thinks that workers out there are not still very sore about that fact is not talking to workers. Anybody who is talking to them knows that is the truth. They are very angry and bitter about the fact that every week or every month when they get their pay cheque there is a little thing in brackets, the "universal social charge", which takes a big chunk out of their wages, that was supposed to be temporary and through which they were paying for the crimes of others. Despite the promises and commitments and despite the fact that this economy has generated a record budget surplus of €24 billion, plus €13 billion in windfall tax from Apple, apparently the Government still cannot keep its promise to get rid of this temporary, emergency unfair tax on working people. It is the working people who generated that surplus. That is who generated it. Surpluses do not pop out of the sky. The surplus in the Irish economy has been generated by the hard work of working people in this country. Even now, when they are generating a record surplus, the Government will not honour its commitment to get rid of the universal social charge. The reason is that it wants to give the benefits of the surplus, the unprecedented wealth that is being generated in this country, to the super-rich, the multimillionaires, the billionaires and the corporations who are enjoying a bonanza in profits and an unprecedented growth in their personal wealth. That is the truth. The Government has robbed the poor to pay the rich and that is why it will not get rid of the universal social charge. That is not just rhetoric but is borne out by the facts.

The detail of all of this is never really discussed but it really is worth spelling out the truth of it. I heard the Minister say that what the Government has done in the budget is progressive but what is not progressive is how much workers earn and how much they pay in tax as against how much corporations earn and how much they pay in tax. The biggest tax head and the biggest source of revenue for the Government, representing 37% of all tax revenue, comes from workers. The total income of all workers in 2023 was €144 billion. They paid €24 billion in tax, which amounts to 16.6% tax on their income when all of the credits and so on are factored in. A total of 3.1 million workers earned €144 billion and paid €24 billion in tax. In contrast, corporations in the same year earned €317 billion but only paid €22 billion in tax, which represents 7.1% of their pre-tax income. Corporations have seen their income go through the roof. They earn vastly more pre-tax income than the 3.1 million workers in this country but they pay less in tax and, proportionately, they pay less than half of what workers pay on their income. That is the truth. Currently corporation tax receipts represent 27% of all tax paid. Workers pay 37% on substantially less income. That figure jumped hugely after the introduction of the USC. The proportion of revenue that was available to the Government from workers jumped. I find it laughable at budget time when finance Ministers and public expenditure Ministers say "I am allocating this to you", when what is actually happening is that they are giving workers back their own money. The money that the Government has was generated by the workers. The Government gives a little bit back to workers but it is giving most of it back in tax breaks to the big corporations that are paying, proportionately, less than half of what workers pay on a far lower amount of income.

I have mentioned the corporations but there are also the individuals who might be subject to the wealth tax that we are proposing. Again, the figures are just mind-boggling. In the fourth quarter of 2023 the Central Bank's quarterly accounts showed that the net wealth of all Irish households was €1.1 trillion. That had increased by €33.2 billion in just the last quarter of 2023. That is an incredible amount of money. It is quite shocking to think there is that much wealth in the country when workers are crushed with the cost of living but helpfully, the Central Bank explains it. Just 10% of Irish households own 54% of that wealth. It is absolutely extraordinary that 10% of Irish households own 54% of €1.1 trillion. That is increasing exponentially, year on year, while the real value of workers' incomes is getting less because of the impact of the cost-of-living crisis and the fact that they continue to be crushed with taxes like the USC. Incredibly, there are now 1,400 individuals in this country with wealth of over €47 million and 20,000 individuals with wealth of over €4.7 million.

There are 20,000 people with more than €4.5 million each in wealth and assets. That is extraordinary. Oxfam has made a simple suggestion that we have been proposing for years. I was happy to see others also proposing a wealth tax that would impose a very small tax on that wealth. It would be imposed on those with more than €4.7 million and would, therefore, affect only the 20,000 richest people in the country, who have a lot of money. The proposition is that there would be a 2% tax on the net wealth of people whose wealth is between €4.7 million and €50 million. There would be a tax of 3% on wealth between €50 million and €1 billion and a tax of 5% on wealth above €1 billion, which would apply to approximately ten individuals. Such people would probably generate 5% growth in that wealth in the course of a year. They would probably not even feel that tax but it would generate approximately €8 billion. We asked the Minister, Deputy Chambers, during the summer how much it would cost to get rid of the USC for everybody earning less than €100,000. The cost would be €2.5 billion. We could remove that brutal austerity tax and dramatically improve the financial situation of hundreds of thousands of workers in this country at the cost of €2.5 billion. We could apply a modest tax on the richest 20,000 multimillionaires in this country. They would not feel the effect of that tax and it would pay for the removal of the USC four times over. There would be money to burn if we did that and we could put that money into other things, such as housing, healthcare and so on. The Government, however, will not do it. Even now, the Commission on Taxation and Welfare and other middle-of-the-road economic think-tanks are saying we should seriously consider introducing wealth taxes. The Government still will not do it. The rich would not even feel it but the workers would feel it a lot. It would be just and fair to do it but the Government will not. It is criminal. It is robbery of the working people of this country who have generated a record budget surplus. We continue to siphon that money into the pockets of superwealthy corporations and the richest in Irish society.

I am sure the Government will not respond in any way but at least we remain consistent is saying that the USC is unfair. It has been a gross imposition on working people. The Government should honour its commitment to get rid of it and should ask the very wealthy of this country, who have done extremely well, and the big corporations to pay a small bit of extra tax to give the working people of this country a bit of justice.

See this speech in context