Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

22. To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the rationale for renewing the Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest legislation, given recent reports that Ireland is the European Union's fastest growing economy; if he had discussions prior to this renewal with the Department of Finance on alternative revenue streams to replace the €2.2 billion that public sector workers contribute to the economy; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [20100/16]

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

How can the Minister say, with a straight face, that he is doing anything other than putting a gun to the head of public sector workers? That gun is called FEMPI. The Minister has really outlined it. There is a series of pieces of legislation that have absolutely no justification any longer because there is no financial emergency. The financial emergency is over and the Government is never short of throwing around figures on the economic growth rates. How can the Minister say he is doing anything other than bullying all -----

Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Please allow the Minister to reply.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

-----public sector workers with this legislation that should be abolished?

Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I wish to correct a point I had made to Deputy Calleary. I should have said "when the agreement is due to expire" as opposed to "when the current agreement has expired".

The FEMPI measures were enacted by the Oireachtas and remain in place until their repeal. Under section 12 of the FEMPI Act 2013, I am obliged to review and report to the Houses of the Oireachtas on the operation, effectiveness and impact of the relevant Acts and consider whether any of the provisions of the relevant Acts continue to be necessary having regard to the purposes of those Acts, the revenues of the State and State commitments in respect of public service pay and pensions.

The report on the review undertaken was laid before both Houses of the Oireachtas on 29 June in accordance with the provisions of the Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest, FEMPI, Act 2013. Among the considerations which informed the determination by me of the necessity for the continuing application of the measures provided for under the Acts were the instability in the international economy, including risks posed by Brexit, the still fragile nature of our economic recovery, the need to protect hard won competitiveness gains, the high level of debt, our continuing need to borrow, the obligation to comply with the Stability and Growth Pact and the need to balance competing demands within the available resources.

The terms of the Lansdowne Road agreement reducing the impact of the pay reductions are being implemented through the FEMPI Act 2015 through a three year programme at a full year cost of €844 million in 2018 with additional provisions providing for a similar programme of reductions in the impact of the public service pension reduction at a full-year cost of €90 million in 2018.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Some of the victims of the FEMPI legislation are sitting in the Visitors Gallery today, newly qualified teachers, young teachers and local authority workers who have been crucified with this emergency legislation first brought in by Fianna Fáil and the Green Party and continued by Fine Gael and the Labour Party.

The Minister has not answered the key question. Is there still an emergency? If there is not an emergency how can he possibly justify continuing to punish these workers? All of the things the Minister mentions, the instability and all the rest, were the fault of these young teachers or nurses or gardaí or local authority workers but they have suffered cruelly as a result. Even at the end of the Lansdowne Road agreement process they will be earning less than they were earning in 2009. Many of the conditions they lost are not even mentioned in the Lansdowne Road agreement.

Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I did answer Deputy Boyd Barrett’s question. I laid out very clearly the reasons why I believe the maintenance of the legislation is needed.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Anti-Austerity Alliance)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

There was no Brexit then.

Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I outlined the reasons for that very clearly and I am sure I will be debating them with the Deputy later on and I believe also on Friday. The full cost of repealing all the FEMPI measures is €2.2 billion.

The challenge for me is that if I consider the issues the Deputy raises regularly with me - the need for housing, for more investment in our health services, bringing more people into frontline roles in our public service - I have to reconcile all of that with the wage and pension costs of supporting those already inside the public services. The additional expenditure required to relinquish that legislation is over €2 billion. Perhaps the Deputy could tell me, and I would appreciate his views on the matter, how I can find that €2 billion-----

Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

We have loads of ideas.

Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

-----while meeting all of the needs that the Deputy raises regularly with me because he is right to raise those issues.

Ruth Coppinger (Dublin West, Anti-Austerity Alliance)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Get the corporation tax.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I have no problem doing that. First, the Minister got a bounce of an extra €2 billion in corporate tax receipts last year. We are €700 million ahead of target on tax revenue at the moment, much of it coming from the corporate sector because we on this side of the House began to demand action on the "double Irish" tax scam that has started to force these corporations to pay a bit more tax. The Minister should use some of that money. He should bring in a financial transaction tax and tax people earning in excess of €100,000 more, instead of maintaining absolutely draconian cuts in the pay and conditions of public sector workers and an Act which has extraordinarily draconian provisions and which can be described as nothing other than bullying. Most of the people who signed up to the agreement only signed up because the Government put a gun to their heads called FEMPI and told them to sign up to this, which was unacceptable, or they would be punished by not getting their increments or allowances and not allowing for promotions. How can the Minister justify that extraordinarily draconian behaviour?

Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I have outlined the rationale for this. I have always made very clear my appreciation for the huge contribution the public service has made to our country at a time of great difficulty but amidst the anger the Deputy has articulated let us also acknowledge two other points about what is happening in our public services, first, over the past two years we have over 18,000 more public servants, the majority of them performing the frontline roles that the Deputy regularly calls for. We have more special needs assistants, SNAs, than we have had before. We are hiring new people to teach, which we were not able to do some years ago. The improvement in our public finances has given the State the ability to do that. Any future change will happen because of a change in our economic circumstances that the Deputy said was never going to happen. He said in this House that we would not see our economy get to a point where its prospects would improve and now with the very improved prospects that he said would not happen he is not acknowledging the change they are making in terms of our ability to hire more people, put more money into our health services and to pay for agreements such as the Lansdowne Road agreement-----

Ruth Coppinger (Dublin West, Anti-Austerity Alliance)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Give people equal pay.

Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

-----which are needed and which have been accepted by the majority of unions in our State.

Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

With a gun to their heads called FEMPI.