Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)

In this budget, the Government has clearly prioritised big business interests and big developers over ordinary people, ordinary families and ordinary businesses. It is a "McBudget". It is hard to swallow what has been put forward, particularly when the Government had the chance to lift 40,000 children out of poverty, help families who are struggling by providing targeted energy credits, introduce a cost-of-disability payment or turbocharge the delivery of affordable housing. Expensive measures like the untargeted VAT cut are a poor trade-off for the lives and futures of the people of Ireland.

The Government had a menu of options available to it in this budget. It is heartbreaking to see it choose to spend money on items of little nutritional value to Irish society. Ordinary people in my constituency of Dublin Rathdown are sick of hearing how great this country is doing economically when they are worse off, their services are under more strain than ever and they see no hope of any meaningful change to fix this. They were clear with me about what was important to them in the context of the budget. They wanted targeted measures in respect of energy costs that would allow them to keep warm in the approaching winter. They wanted housing that is actually affordable, not measures that better facilitate profiteering and make a mockery of the term "cost rental". They wanted the Government to make good on its promises regarding the abolition of the carer's allowance means test. They wanted steps taken towards a public childcare system, and for the cost to be brought down to the price quoted to them on the doorsteps during the election campaign last year and in the programme for Government. They wanted children brought out of poverty. Not one single child should live in poverty. In our wealthy country, the height of this Government’s ambition is that 3% will grow up in poverty by 2030. They want more for their society, their community and their families than the Government has delivered. They know the Government made a choice to put big business and developers before ordinary people.

I will speak to two specific matters, namely supports for small businesses and the basic income for the arts programme. What is being done in respect of both represents the worst traits of this budget and this Government - poor execution and wasted opportunities spun so hard they are incomprehensible. Small, independent businesses have been left high and dry to struggle on as the majority of business supports go to the big chains. The key parts of this budget that were lauded as a support for SMEs are funnelling money into the pockets of the big chains and multinational companies, while small local businesses have to count the pennies that come from their razor-thin profit margins. The excuses put forward by the Ministers for Finance and public expenditure on radio this morning boil down to the idea that they did not help SMEs because they wanted to protect the broader economy. As if our small Irish businesses do not provide employment, pay tax and contribute to this country. The economy this Government has built our futures around is one which places no value on small independent business and places all our eggs in one FDI basket, failing to protect us from global upheavals or tariffs. We need the Government to build an economy where small independent businesses are paramount, particularly as their profits stay in the communities while the profits of McDonald's shareholders are siphoned away.

We offered solutions on targeted measures to help our struggling local businesses, but these have fallen on deaf ears. We heard about the focus on supporting businesses, but this Government only seems interested in the big boys and their lobbyists. The basic income for the arts pilot scheme has been lauded as a success by the Government, but it has actually been cut. In the middle of leaks to the media and victorious announcements about the basic income being made permanent, the Government seems to have overlooked reality. Some 2,000 artists will lose their basic income in February, and nobody knows when the successor scheme will start or what it will look like. A permanent scheme is welcome, but it is cold comfort to the artist who told my office this morning that losing her basic income in February means she will not be able to continue working as an artist. She described the announcement as a phenomenally cruel thing. When the Minister was questioned about this at the press conference yesterday, his answer was, "Bear with me and toughen on for a while." The beauty of this scheme is that it offered artists stability in a field rife with precarity, yet we are subjecting them to the exact same uncertainty and insecurity that basic income was supposed to stop.

Briseann sé mo chroí an easpa dóchais a chloisteáil ó na healaíontóirí atá ag glaoch ar m’oifig. Is breá linn a rá go bhfuil muid ag tacú leis na healaíona ach nuair a thagann am an bhuiséid, tá siad á gcaitheamh sna fataí lofa ag Fianna Fáil agus Fine Gael agus beimid uile thíos leis. We can have real change in this country, change that means ordinary people will not have to struggle to keep their heads above water year after year. Every budget involves a choice, and I am sad and angry to see so many wrong choices made in the context of budget 2026.

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