Results 36,241-36,260 of 40,330 for speaker:Leo Varadkar

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: The courts will decide, as they decided on Deputy Doherty. He was prosecuted and taken to court.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: What I acknowledged yesterday is that the very real housing crisis we face in this country is a disaster for many people. It may not be for the 60% or 70% of us who are lucky enough to own our own homes, whether through a mortgage or outright, but it is certainly a disaster for people who cannot afford to buy a home and really want to and for people who are paying very significant...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: There is one point on which I agree with the Deputy, which is that the housing crisis affects a great number of people in society in different ways, whether it is people experiencing homelessness, people paying unaffordable rents, people who want to buy their first home but cannot or people who own their own home but who still have adult children living with them, which they find very...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: Listening to the Deputy's contribution, somebody would be forgiven for thinking we had done nothing at all this year. We have taken a lot of action this year, including increases in the State pension, weekly welfare payments and the minimum wage. We are currently in negotiations with public servants about pay increases for them. A lot of pay increases are happening in the private sector at...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: Looking at the facts and statistics, and the data are produced by the Central Statistics Office, CSO, so it is not my opinion; they are just facts, for the past few years up to this year, average earnings have risen faster than inflation. That is true in respect of the minimum wage, public sector pay and pay generally. This year is different. We are seeing unprecedented inflation and...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: -----and reducing the cost of public transport, as we have done. We have to see it as a package in the round. That is the way the Government is approaching it.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: I thank the Deputy for raising this important issue. We believe it is appropriate to apply inheritance tax on transfers of wealth between generations. If people are taxed on earned income, it is only fair that people should also be taxed if they inherit income. It has always been recognised, however, that where the beneficiary is a child, including certain foster children, there should be...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: I thank the Deputy. We are not going to abolish inheritance tax. As I said earlier, we think it appropriate that if we tax earned income for which people have worked, it is, therefore, also appropriate that we tax unearned income that people receive by means of inheritance, capital gains or other means but I agree that we should increase the thresholds over time. That threshold of...

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: I would argue we have already introduced an emergency budget. Some €1 billion worth of budget measures kicked in only in January. Since then, we have approved a further €1.4 billion in additional emergency measures after the budget, including the reduction in VAT, the reduction in excise on petrol and diesel, the €200 discount on electricity bills for every household...

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: As the Deputy mentioned, the ESRI recommends a number of measures in its report. I was interested to hear spokespeople for the ESRI talk in interviews about discounts on energy bills - one of the things we have done - as another option and one that benefits lower income households more than higher income households, proportionately. They also talked about increasing income tax credits,...

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: I will ask Bus Éireann to take a further look at this. The Minister of State at the Department of Transport, Deputy Naughton, announced that from Monday, 21 February 2022 the age at which an applicant for a driving licence must supply a medical report is going to increase from 70 to 75. Drivers under 75 will no longer have to supply a medical report confirming their fitness to drive...

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: Deputy McGrath must be the one who is out of touch if he needs an ESRI report this morning to tell him that we have a cost of living crisis.

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: Anybody filling their car with petrol or diesel-would have known that for months.

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: Anyone looking at their utility bills over the past couple of months would know that. They would know we are facing a cost of living crisis, that we have high inflation and that it is largely driven by energy prices.

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: On interest rates, the Deputy knows the answer to this. We have higher interest rates in Ireland relative to other countries and there are three reasons for that. They have higher bank charges than we do. In those countries they have bigger markets so there is more competition, and also in Ireland, for very good reasons, we make it very hard to repossess properties and evict people-----

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: -----which means often debts go unpaid for years and years. The truth is that the cost of that is socialised.

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: We are very aware of the risk of famine that now arises from the food security issues that have been thrown up by Putin's invasion of Ukraine. I attended talks in Geneva earlier this week where this was very much on the agenda for trade ministers. On our humanitarian response, I am not sure exactly what is planned. I know that we have something planned through our overseas development aid...

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: We need to do everything possible to accelerate the number of new homes being built. As I said earlier, it is accelerating. Some 25,000 new homes were built in the past 12 months, 35,000 are under construction and 45,000 are going through planning. One can really see that pipeline coming through. It took us a while to get there, and we are still only getting there, but it is coming...

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: I say to these businesses that we understand the pressures they are under. This is why we reduced excise and took 20 cent off petrol and 15 cent off diesel, but unfortunately we do not control those prices as they are internationally determined. This is why we put in place the 9% VAT rate for the hospitality sector, which is particularly important given the tourism hot spot that Cork south...

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (16 Jun 2022)

Leo Varadkar: I do not think there is any one single way that is best to help working families or middle-income people with the cost of living. There are a number of different ways. I have never been in favour of just one solution or saying there is just one solution to these challenges. Obviously, one way is through pay. This is why we increased the minimum wage this year and why I announced just this...