Martin Mansergh (Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Minister and his officials to the House. I congratulate him warmly on his part in the budget. Like last year, he, together with the Minister for Finance, the Taoiseach and the rest of the Government contributed to a significant gear shift since 1997, when the concentration was on having an efficient, dynamic economy. The accent in the past couple of years, in particular, has been on ensuring that the benefits are shared and that there is social equity and inclusion. For example, there was an article on 12 December from Mr. Tim Callan of the ESRI stating that the budget should prove to be the fairest in years.

The organisation CORI used to be extraordinarily critical at budget time. After Deputy Quinn's last budget, CORI issued a fairly excoriating critique of it, which I felt went beyond the party line. I asked Fr. Healy if he approved of any budget in the past ten years to which he replied, "I would need notice of that question". It is good that we are now in a situation where the critique refers to major progress on inclusion and significant developments on the fairness agenda. Obviously, there is always more to be done.

However, if one thinks back to 15 or 20 years ago, unemployment assistance increased by 2% or 3% and if one was lucky, these increases were paid in July. The child benefit increase announced in the budget might be paid in November. The full benefit would be paid in the following calendar year. We have moved on enormously, which is to be welcomed.

There are one or two changes which I especially like. On pensions, we have gone far beyond whether the changes reflect the rate of inflation in the past 12 months or in the 12 months to come, which was a topic of discussion under the Fine Gael-Labour Party coalition of the 1980s. Given what the Minister said, the changes are well ahead of the increase in the CPI and gross earnings over the same period. A particularly welcome measure is the special earnings disregard of €100 a week for people on non-contributory pensions. It would be very difficult if it were just old people who had no means of supplementing their income without loss. For many people, the opportunity to earn something, be active and contribute to the community means a great deal. This is a most humane and enlightened measure on which I congratulate the Minister.

The Minister dealt with the EU survey on income and living conditions in Ireland. I did not like the line carried in Independent Newspapers a few mornings ago which tried to rubbish the social side of the budget by saying that it was increasing poverty traps. It is a wonderful way of making out that the writers or the newspaper organ are concerned about those on social welfare but actually believe the Government is being too generous and that a rigorous and Spartan approach would be better if it did not increase the level of poverty.

I am not denying the reality of poverty traps. I had a debate with Deputy Healy on local radio about the question of child dependant allowance and why it had not been increased. There are two points to that question, one of principle and one of pragmatism. The pragmatic money aspect of the matter is that if a woman gets €1,000 into her hand she will not worry too much about whether it is called child dependant allowance, child benefit or a supplementary allowance.

The reason there ceased to be an increase in the allowance goes back to the time of an interdepartmental group established under the rainbow coalition when Proinsias De Rossa, MEP, was Minister for Social Welfare. That group was of the view that increasing child dependant allowance as opposed to other child payments contribute to poverty traps. It is not a good idea to have payments that will be promptly taken away the moment a recipient takes up work. I calculated that the €1,000 payment for children under the age of six is the equivalent of a 140% increase in child dependant allowance. Those measures are bound to have a significant impact on child poverty.

I have reservations about means testing in regard to payments. Apart from anything else, means testing involves bureaucracy, it has been related to tax and was reviewed when Albert Reynolds was Minister for Finance when there was some furore about it. There is considerable merit in the making of universal payments, particularly in regard to children.

I am sure the Minister is constantly on the look-out for small anomalies where the money factor is not a significant consideration. I had representations on behalf of priests temporarily back on holidays from the missions. An administrative decision was taken they should no longer receive the old age pension when they are back here. I have been in correspondence with the Minister about that and he might consider it.

A long-term unemployed young person will not receive the back to work allowance if he or she decides to improve his or her skills and go into an apprenticeship. That is an anomaly that should be addressed. It is a disincentive that should not be there and is not socially useful. Overall, however, I warmly congratulate the Minister on an excellent budget. It contains an excellent social dimension.