Seanad debates

Wednesday, 3 December 2003

Order of Business. - Budget Statement: Motion.

 

I welcome the proposal on public private partnerships. It is bad there has been no change in the tax bands, although not for people like us or for people with high incomes. We are going back on what we did some years ago when we brought people, particularly the lower paid, out of the tax net. We are now pulling them back into it. I do not see the logic of that for the sake of a small amount of money. Given the type of society and community we are trying to build, it is not a good way in which to move forward. This is penny-pinching, particularly in light of the Minister's prognosis for the next three years. He said that next year, he expects GNP to increase to between 3% and 3.3% and that economic growth in 2005 will be 4% and 4.5% in the following year. These are impressive figures but if we are going to make that kind of money, we must examine how we will share it out.

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