Joe O'Reilly (Fine Gael)

It should not go unnoticed that the Green Party, which was so shrilly loud in its calls for a debate on Seanad reform, is now going out to see the plum jobs it has got in the reshuffle. Its interest is clearly in the plum jobs rather than reform of this House. Many of the Leader's Members have similarly departed.

I support the motion proposed by Senator Fitzgerald. There is a consensus in the House calling for people in the Passport Office to call off the dispute. However, we cannot lose sight of the fact that the root of the public anger and the public service anger is that those earning less than €30,000 were targeted. That was wrong, unjust and immoral. However, the point I want specifically debated is that the real own goal is that higher civil servants were given an exemption from the full rigours of the income levies on the grounds they were losing bonuses. Bonuses were only paid for doing their jobs in the first place. That was the own goal that removed the confidence of lower Civil Service staff in the system and caused alienation and bitterness. I ask for the Minister for Finance to attend the Chamber, debate the matter with us again and retract his position on higher civil servants. Therein lies the kernel of the difficulty. Senator Ó Murchú often talks of the need for a national effort. There would be no difficulty with that if it was predicated on fairness. The absence of fairness is at issue.

Senator Donohoe raised the point that there has been an inordinate waiting list for medical card processing even before this go-slow. The delay in processing carer's allowance was in excess of two months. Farm assist cases go back to September, and there is a problem with jobseeker's allowance. I ask the Leader to have a separate debate on that issue because the least anybody in the poverty trap deserves is a speedy response. There is potential to solve that problem, and it needs debate. That was the case, even without the current action.