Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)

An teachtaireacht mhór anseo atá ag an Aire do na ghnáthdhaoine ná go bhfuil siad tréigthe agus fágtha leo féin. Budget atá anseo atá scríofa ag Fine Gael. Tréigeann sé oibrithe agus teaghlaigh chun aire a thabhairt dóibh siúd atá ar bharr an dréimire. Cuidiú ar bith do chostais maireachtála, gníomh ar bith chun an sáinn a stopadh nó faoiseamh ar bith ar cháin. Is dréachtphlean é chun leanúint go deo le géarchéim tithíochta agus sláinte agus geallúintí toghcháin scriosta agus caite sa bhosca bruscair. An chéad cinneadh agus an chéad impleacht a bhéas ag an budget seo ná go rachaidh praghas petrol agus diesel in airde. Tá sé seo scannalach. Is é seo ceann de na Rialtais is measa a chonaic muid ariamh.

As generations of Irish parents remind their children, is deas do do bhéal a mholtar é - self-praise is no praise at all. That is what just echoed loudly right across these benches of the Dáil - self-congratulatory applause and backslapping that would make you all blush with embarrassment and shame. When all the clapping is done and all the backslapping is over, when the Government benches die down and the dust settles on all of the spin we have heard and on the bluster and deluded arrogance that has come dripping from both Ministers' speeches, where are ordinary people? They are left in the cold. Harsh reality is written here in the black and white of this budget. The Government's big message in this budget, and people have heard it loud and clear, is that people are on their own. This is a budget written by Fine Gael that abandons workers and families to look after those at the top. There is no help with the cost-of-living crisis, no action to end the rip-off, no break on taxes, a blueprint for the continuation of the never-ending crises in our housing and health, and election promises torn up, one after the other, and thrown in the bin.

The first decision and impact of this budget will be that petrol and diesel will go up tonight, hitting hard-pressed families already. It is one of the worst Government decisions we have had. I am shocked at what is in this budget. I was asked earlier by somebody in the media what I thought. I said that I did not believe it, that there would be something the Government would pull out of the hat, and there was no way it would abandon workers in the way that was suggested but, by God, it did that. It gave them nothing. This budget reads as a catalogue of hand-outs for those at the top. If you are a big corporate landlord, a wealthy property developer or one of the bailed-out banks, this budget is a mighty sweet package for you. However, if you are one of the hundreds of thousands of ordinary households impacted by the cost-of-living crisis, or one of the people facing the avalanche of rip-off bills and struggling to make ends meet at the end of the week, then this budget screws you over. It is empty, hollow and a dead end.

The only applause or kudos that should have been offered to members of the Government today are for the warped fiction they created in their own heads that enabled them to write this budget because it bears no connection whatsoever with what is actually going on out there in the real world. It has no connection with what is happening in the everyday lives of working people throughout Ireland. I have to hand it to you, lads. In fairness, bravo to them. Only Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil could look at a cost-of-living crisis staring everybody in the face, with households hanging on by their fingernails, and say to themselves, "You know what is needed here? Big tax breaks for our wealthy pals and more help to feather the nests of the privileged few at the expense of the many." Well done. Only you guys, the parties that have been messing things up for ordinary people for over a century, could have come up with that one.

This should have been a cost-of-living budget. What was needed and what people were demanding was a budget that would make life affordable. The dogs in the street could tell you that. It is far and away the biggest issue impacting people right across the State. Households are being hit by out-of-control prices right across the board. Costs keep rising. They go up and up, the bills keep on coming and working families, and parents who work hard all week, are coming under severe pressure to take care of the basics, including to put food on the table, to keep the heating and lights on, to put clothes on their children's backs and to keep a car on the road. Yet, you lads have the brass neck to waltz in here, puff out your chests, smile at each other and backslap and applaud each other when there is no measure in this budget to help ordinary workers stay afloat under the wave of rising costs, where people cannot catch their breath without being hit by another price hike.

How out of touch does the Government need to get? Was there nobody on the backbenches? We have heard a lot about the backbenchers and parties not listening to them. Was there nobody on the backbenches who told these lads that there is a cost-of-living crisis out there and people needed to be looked after? The big question today is what has happened. During the general election, Government parties told everybody that the cost of living was the number one issue and would be dealt with by those parties. Simon Harris went everywhere. Everywhere a mic or camera could be found, he said the cost-of-living issue was his number priority and if he got elected, he would deal with that. The Government delivered nothing for them in this budget. It screwed workers over royally in this budget. It will not be lost on anybody that in last year's budget, just ahead of the election, there was no problem about providing a cost-of-living package. It is now clear that was just a sweetener, bribing people with their own money for votes. What the Government has got is what it wanted. What we have is a situation where things are worse, where more people are feeling under pressure, more people cannot pay their bills, prices continue to rise and the Government decides that a cost-of-living package is not necessary.

What does the Government say to the renter who is already forking out €2,000 a month and knows that more crippling hikes are on the way because it refuses to introduce a rent increase ban? The Minister stated it is providing a renter's tax relief, but he knows and I know that providing a renter's tax credit without stopping rent increases means that money does not go into the tenant's pocket; it goes into the landlord's back pocket. That is the reality of it. What does the Government say to the stressed-out couple, when Paschal Donohoe and Simon Harris promised a plan to deliver €200 a month in childcare within the first 100 days of Government? What does it say to the motorist who is being ripped off by greedy insurance companies that are jacking up prices and premiums non-stop? There is nothing in this budget to help them. Indeed, they will be hit worse by pushing up the price of petrol and diesel. What does it say to the people who are fleeced week in, week out in their food shopping? If you were to read this budget, you would swear the Government believes that is not happening. It has very little to say them because it has left them high and dry.

The Government is not stopping there because it is kicking people when they are already down. It has hit people again and again. Today, it is delivering a huge volume of tax cuts - no doubt about it - but ordinary workers get nothing. Zero, zilch, not a cent. The squeezed middle are not getting anything. Who is getting it? There are tax cuts in this budget. Who is getting them? If you are one of the persons, for example, on the SARP, then Paschal Donohoe has made sure there is €60 million in taxpayers' money to help you. What do they get? People at home will not even believe this. They get a tax cut of over €100,000. This is for people who have to be earning over €125,000 and up to €1 million. Those are the priorities of this Government but the families I talk to in my constituency, who are out there working, earning €30,000, €40,000 or €50,000, get nothing in this budget in terms of tax breaks. Others get tax breaks as well. Developers and landlords will get tax breaks and, of course, the sweetheart deals for the banks remain.

You could not make this up if you tried. At a time when households are watching every single euro and need support from the Government, it sticks its hand in their pocket to pickpocket them for the money to fatten the coffers of the wealthy. That says it all about this Government's priorities. It says it all about what we get after nearly 15 years of Fine Gael in power. Is it any wonder that one in five children now lives in poverty in this State? Is it any wonder that more than 5,000 children are homeless under Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael? You only have to look at the Government's limp response in relation to the big energy rip-off. A record number of households, 300,000, cannot pay their electricity. Nearly 200,000 cannot pay their gas bills and, starting tomorrow, they will see double-digit electricity price rises but no energy credits in this budget. The Ministers walked in here today and told those households the Government is cancelling the energy credits they relied on for the past number of years. That is shameful even for Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil.

The Government has presented a budget as if it is all rosy in the garden out there and the cost-of-living crisis has gone away. It has not. We know that prices are going up and up. In this budget, families have been left hammered. It leaves people in no doubt whose side Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil are on. Let me be clear: energy credits were never the full answer. They were supposed to buy this Government time to get energy costs down for households but it is time it has squandered. It has refused to take on the big energy companies, which are making bumper profits out of people's hardship. They squeeze and gouge their customers but the Government sits there and does nothing. These companies know they have nothing at all to fear from this Government, so they have free rein to keep jacking up prices, and to keep squeezing and gouging, because Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil will do nothing about it.

As we now enter into the winter, when households have to put on their heating for longer and their lights for even longer, people will now be fleeced when they do not have energy credits to shield them. That is on both of the Ministers. That is on the Cabinet that signed off on this budget. There is no doubt about it, but there will be more families this winter who cannot pay their electricity and gas bills as a direct consequence of the decision the Ministers have taken here today.

It is not just energy companies that are gouging people. The Government is turning a blind eye to price gouging right across the board. Insurance companies, banks and large supermarkets all make obscene profits off the backs of ordinary workers. By any measure, this Government has failed to get a grip on the cost of living and the rip-off rolls on. Prices are still out of control and the Government is nowhere to be seen. Insurance companies have made the point many times that they are making profits that are two or three times what they make anywhere else, yet the Government allows them to do it. Bailed out banks are making billions - not millions, billions - of euro of profit but pay no tax. That is acceptable under the Minister for Finance's plans. There is no oversight whatsoever of supermarket pricing and profits.

Workers and families are looking on today and will be asking how we can have a surplus this year of more than €10 billion and next year of more than €5 billion and there is not any real help for them in this budget. The answer is clear - Fine Gael, with a typical nod from Fianna Fáil, is cheating them at every turn. The sly, sleeveen way of doing business is written all over this budget, presented on every page. For one thing, the Government takes the students of Ireland for fools. That is what it is doing here.

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