Martin Mansergh (Fianna Fail)

I move amendment No. 1:

To delete all words after "Seanad Éireann" and substitute the following:

"notes the very significant improvements in the Irish tax system under the current Government, including:

increasing the number of income earners who are now out of the tax net from 380,000 ten years ago to 776,000 now;

exempting those on the minimum wage from tax;

reducing from 20% to 8% the tax burden for the married one-earner on the average wage. While the annual gross income has increased by €12,000, the tax bill has fallen by €1,500;

ensuring the four-fifths of earners pay no more than one-fifth of their earnings in income tax; and

reducing the tax rates under most tax heads while ensuring that tax yield continued to rise due to extra economic activity accompanying the policy, and calls on the Minister for Finance to continue the reform of the tax system, having regard to the competitiveness of the economy and the equity of the system and asks that the Minister bears in mind the situation of house purchasers and the housing market in framing his Budget."

I welcome this discussion, which can be only a discussion because any budgetary decisions will be taken in a week's time and the Government does not have a substantive position on tax matters a week before the budget. Senator John Paul Phelan tried to make the case that every change made in the past ten years made matters only worse. The moral of that would seem to be to leave things exactly as they are.