John Paul Phelan (Fine Gael)

I welcome the Minister for this important discussion. The Government's decision in the mini-budget to remove the Christmas bonus is very short-sighted and there is a great level of anger about it. I was on the campaign trail in Senator Twomey's home area of Wexford over the weekend and it was an issue that was continuously raised with me by people who were directly affected. It is short-sighted in the sense that the Christmas bonus was not money that was put in people's pockets and kept there; it was money that was spent in the economy in the run-up to Christmas. The cut will remove a great deal of spending capability for the people who receive such bonuses. It is also downright mean-spirited for that time of year.

I am particularly struck by the number of pensioners who have raised the issue with me. They used to spend the money at Christmas but it will no longer be available to them. The fact that this is a direct cash injection into the economy at Christmas time and not money that would be saved or kept in any other way highlights the short-sightedness of the move by the Government. I deeply regret the decision to remove the Christmas bonus as announced in the mini-budget two weeks ago.

I also wish to refer to the issue of pensions. In my area of the south east, the big issue with regard to pensions in recent months has been the case of Waterford Crystal. Many workers, having given a lifetime of service to that company, find that the pension fund contains no funds and that after perhaps more than 40 years of service, they have no pension provision. I was disappointed with the Minister's remarks in a television interview that they could fall back on the State pension. It is not good enough that people would pay into a pension scheme such as that at Waterford Crystal over a lifetime's work and then, when the company gets into financial difficulty, find that the pension scheme as instituted no longer exists.

This results from a complete failure of the Government to implement EU directives and goes back to the early 1980s, when an EU directive specifically dealt with the area of pensions and pensions protection but was never fully transposed into Irish law. As a result of the Government failure to transpose the directive, these workers in Waterford Crystal and other bodies across the country find themselves with no pensions.

It is interesting to look across the water to Britain, which has protected similar pension schemes up to, I understand, a total of £30,000, depending on years of service. The British Government has produced a programme where those pensions would be protected. A similar programme should have been introduced in this country and should still be introduced to protect those people who find themselves in that unenviable situation.

It is particularly galling for people in that situation when they read about the lavish pay-offs to the Ministers of State who were removed from their positions last week by the Taoiseach and received €53,000 in a golden handshake. The Minister and some of her colleagues have featured in the media recently on the level of pension provision they will receive, which is particularly galling for people who find themselves after a lifetime's work without any hope of the pension scheme they believed would support them in their retirement years.

The Bill is a bit of a smokescreen. The Government has delayed tackling the serious obligations towards workers' pension entitlements that we have discussed on the Opposition benches for many months. The Government ignored the EU insolvency directive by failing to transcribe it into Irish law. That directive has been on the books for approximately 30 years. The Government continually tells people why they should vote in a particular way on the Lisbon treaty, but it is difficult to square that message with the failure of Government to transcribe a European directive that would have directly improved the lives of retired workers if it were implemented here.

I am also disappointed at the time allowed for the Bill. I do not know why Second Stage could not have been taken today with Committee and Remaining Stages taken tomorrow or next week. I believe it could have been taken next week.