Marc MacSharry (Fianna Fail)

As Members have mentioned, it is budget day. I look forward to the debate tomorrow when we will have an opportunity to discuss the measures and to express the hope that today's announcement will be fair and, to the maximum extent possible, that it will protect the most vulnerable in society. In that context if it is so deemed that higher sections of the public services or the semi-State sector must take pay cuts then, unlike Senator O'Toole, I have no difficulty with it. If people within the semi-State sector or the senior Civil Service determine, following a pay cut, that they must revert to the private sector then I wish them well. We will be sorry to lose them. However, no one will hold the State to ransom regardless of whether it is a salary issue. I share the view that we must have economists working for us but I do not share the view that we cannot afford them. There are many economists available and they need not be those who command the massive salaries and who go on various television shows as celebrity economists.

Following the budgetary discussions tomorrow I call for an urgent debate on the new system of dealing with mortgage arrears introduced by the Central Bank yesterday. Senator McFadden remarked last week that she had encountered a family which, to pay the mortgage, had to turn off the electricity and not fed the children for a few days. This is replicated throughout the country. These will be further replicated and we must have the legislative reform for which the Prevention of Family Homes Repossessions Group has pushed for some two years now, that is, to amend the Enforcement of Court Orders Act to prohibit the granting of a court order for the repossession of a family home. It would cost the State more to house, heat and feed these people. We must protect family homes, not trophy homes. Whether it is this or the next Government, this legislative reform must take place quickly to give families the protection they require.