Paul Lawless (Mayo, Aontú)

A person would not recognise this budget from the pre-election and electioneering that went on in Fine Gael last year. This budget has much more to do with the election cycle and the fact that there will not be an election for a number of years. It is important to remember what Fine Gael and its leader Simon Harris said last November in terms of making work pay. Has this promise been delivered on in this budget? Absolutely not. Nothing has been done for the squeezed middle in Ireland. What has Fine Gael done for the people it talks about who get up early in the morning? The truth is that absolutely nothing has been done. The standard rate of cut-off for a single person, for example, is still at €44,000, before they reach a higher rate of tax. That is incredibly low. Ten years ago, that was a decent salary. It may even have purchased a home for a person but now in this time of such a level of inflation, that is no longer sufficient. What the Government effectively has done is make people significantly less well off. If there is a reason why the public are cynical when it comes to politicians, they need to look no further than the leadership and the rhetoric coming into the general election and the outcome of the first budget delivered here. It is absolutely shocking that so many families waking up this morning are actually less well off because of the Government. That is not what people were told before the general election.

The carbon tax went up again last night. There is absolutely no argument for a carbon tax at a time when over 300,000 people are in energy arrears and we have a cost-of-living crisis. What are the people in Kiltimagh, Ballinrobe, Newport or Foxford and all of these places across County Mayo to do? What public transport do they have? They have none. The carbon tax was designed to essentially change behaviour. There is no Luas or DART or public transport in all of these towns. As many families cannot afford to buy an electric vehicle, they have no choice but to turn on their diesel engines and stop at the pump. No matter how much it is increased, the carbon tax will not change behaviour because the Government has not offered the incentives. However, the Government is willing to offer the stick and will keep beating the people with the stick, it seems. There is no end to the stick in terms of the carbon tax.

The situation with regard to housing is the most egregious in relation to this budget. The Government has reduced VAT on apartments from 13.5% to 9%. The argument is that this will tackle the viability gap. The Government makes the argument very well that there is a viability gap when it comes to apartments. There is a viability gap when it comes to housing right across Ireland. That is why we have a situation which has emerged where we have a housing crisis, where there is a peak in demand for houses and yet so many parts of rural Ireland in particular are not developing. I speak to builders regularly. They would be delighted if they could purchase a site and develop a housing estate but the issue is that the cost of building is prohibitive. That is actually the viability gap that the Government speaks of but it did nothing for housing development and nothing to address that for ordinary families. I speak to other families who have planing permission, jobs and mortgages but are not building. The reason for this is that they cannot afford to. That is a viability gap and it is actually choking housing delivery right across Ireland. What has the Government done for these people in the budget? Nothing. Instead, the Government acknowledges and recognises that there is a viability gap in apartments but not for houses, not for homes for ordinary families.

That is absolutely shocking. The Minister then gave mention to housing schemes and talked about social housing. Let me tell him about housing delivery in Mayo under the schemes he spoke of. Five affordable homes were delivered in Mayo over the last number of years. Under the cost-rental scheme, zero affordable homes were delivered and just 19 under the first home scheme in Mayo. The housing schemes are not working and the Government is not willing to address the issue of viability and reduce the cost of construction for ordinary families. It is families who are the building blocks of this society. Most apartment complexes are developed by institutional investment firms and will never be sold to ordinary families. Many will be built to rent. That is the priority of the Government when it comes to housing. It is absolutely appalling that, on the one hand, the Minister recognises that there is a viability issue in terms of apartments, but he can come to Mayo and I will show him. I will introduce him to builders. I will introduce him to families with planning permission who cannot afford to build. What has the Minister done for those people? It is absolutely appalling.

On the day the budget was announced, we learned that the GAA manager Séamus "Banty" McEnaney earned €231 million from the State for housing asylum seekers. Under this Government, it seems that the only people who have figured out how to thrive are the ones who have seen the opportunity in the migration crisis. This budget could be aptly renamed as the budget of Banty and the billionaires because this is certainly not a budget for ordinary families trying to build, trying to get by and trying to survive in this cost-of-living crisis.

I also note the mentions of transport in the budget - mentions of the DART and the Dublin metro, all very Dublin centric. We need to develop regional areas in Ireland and introduce a balanced development where we have a country that is not overheating in one city and concentrated in one area. There is no mention, for example, of the western rail corridor, the development of the N17 or indeed the Galway ring road, which has been promised and planned for over 20 years.

On agriculture, the tillage sector is in crisis. One of the reasons is that it is competing with imports of an inferior standard. For example, a significant amount of genetically modified grain is being imported into Europe and into Ireland, and our own producers cannot compete on such an unequal playing field. It is disappointing that the tillage sector has not been supported because that sector is fundamental in terms of foodstuff for the agri sector right across Ireland in terms of bedding and so on.

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