Michael McCarthy (Labour)

I welcome the debate on the Finance Bill. In terms of dealing with Bills this week, the Labour Party proposed that we clear the schedule and remove our motion of no confidence if the Government agreed to an orderly timeframe. In participating in that, a lot of political commonsense prevailed earlier this week in the context of how we do our business in the Oireachtas. There was a meeting of minds, political maturity and consideration of the seriousness of the issue and the timeframe.

People want a general election. It was our considered view that, given the manner in which the Government was disintegrating, the sooner we dealt with the Bill in the Dáil and Seanad and proceeded with the election the sooner we would achieve the desired outcome. Unfortunately, the situation is not as clearcut as that for some people. A former Member of this House, representing Sinn Féin, who is now a Member of the other House, viewed our position as supporting the Bill. Our position is quite clear; we oppose the Bill and will be voting against it.

It is one of the most draconian Bills either House has dealt with. The budget was one of the most severe introduced by any Minister. Pensioners, students and the unemployed have seen basic levels of social welfare reduced. Other sectors of society have suffered disproportionately from the economic collapse. If one considers the situation in an historic context, one will understand there was a global collapse but things were much worse in Ireland in terms of the handling of our economy and the political input behind the ideology that governed the country over the past 13 or 14 years.

The Progressive Democrats might be gone but its ideological monolith will be in place for a long time to come. Its right-wing ideology that corrodes an equal society is very much evident in Ireland today. I wish to tell our colleagues in Sinn Féin that in supporting the process we have allowed an orderly timetable in which we can dispose of this business and proceed to a general election.

Part of the reason we are in our current mess is because of the blanket guarantee. A Sinn Féin Member of the House read into the record of this House his support and that of Sinn Féin for the blanket guarantee. They participated in the vote when the Labour Party took a political gamble in standing back and voting against it. Sinn Féin supported it and is no different to the Government on this issue. It cannot conveniently say that other parties supported the Bill when it is contributing to facilitating the arrangement of the debate in order that the country can get the general election it so badly needs.

We have seen some tough and challenging political and economic times in this country over the years. We all remember the 1980s, in terms of unemployment and emigration, issues we thought would be consigned to that decade. Unfortunately, they are now very much a feature of 2009-11 and we have returned to the ugly scene of emigration and unemployment.

Youth unemployment is a major issue. If we are not careful we will see a whole generation of young people caught in the trap of long-term unemployment. We all know what that does to people's morale, dignity and self esteem. Thousands of people are struggling to pay utility bills, put groceries on the table and find another €10 or €15 to provide essentials. That is all a result of the blanket guarantee, political and economic mismanagement and the disastrous decision to include Anglo Irish Bank in the guarantee and pour billions of euro of taxpayers' money into a black hole.

From 1995 to 2000 most of our GDP revolved around exports which was a good thing. We need to remind ourselves that as bad as things are, other sectors of the economy, in particular exports, are good, and augur well for the future. From 2000-05 there was a property bubble. We all know the capitalist vultures who borrowed money and the idiotic bankers at the highest echelons of our banking system who poured millions on top of billions of euro. We had an economy which was largely based on credit and was false. There was bonus-driven lending and no proper stress testing.

All of the bankers are in no small part responsible for the mess the country is currently in. It is disgusting to turn on the national broadcaster and see a former executive of Anglo Irish Bank in Massachusetts living in a $4 million house while people in this country are barely hanging on to their homes and jobs and those in receipt of a blind pension are losing €8 a week. These are the people who are being picked on, targeted and victimised by the right wing Government in order to bring money into the system which we can throw it at Anglo Irish Bank.

Our banking system has been bailed out, recapitalised and propped up. Banks provide statistics to the effect that there is a 70% approval rate for lending. No one believes that rubbish. We want a banking system which will lend money to small and medium enterprises that are the backbone of the economy. We need to get small and medium businesses back into liquidity, get money moving, circulate money in local economies and sustain jobs, particularly in areas such as west Cork and rural Ireland. Many parts of the economy depend on such lending to survive.

On jobs in rural Ireland, the decision to abolish the Christmas bonus was short-sighted. The Minister for Social Protection may have saved some money in the short term but in the long term the rural economy has lost money and as a result rural jobs have been lost. Pensioners and the long-term unemployed were spending the Christmas bonus in the local economy. I do not know anybody who saved it and when the money was not given it was not spent. As a result, demand in local economies contracted and the knock-on effect was extremely negative.

The schools building programme is an old chestnut. We have all raised matters on the Adjournment and the Minister of State, Deputy Haughey, has taken many Adjournment matters over the years regarding extensions to schools. I will not be parochial but I have to sound a note of caution on the Tánaiste's announcement that 400 projects had been given the green light. In recent years a lot of language was used to band different projects and put them at various stages of design, planning and detail.

There are no shovel-ready projects, even though projects are ready to go and would reboot a rural economy. We all know the jobs, skills and trades that have been lost in recent times would be best put to use if the Department of Education and Skills decided to replace the prefabricated buildings it is renting. A lot of dead money is being spent on rent and the money would be better invested in building schools.

One feature of the election will be strong. The electorate are discerning and holding politicians and political parties to account, and rightly so. The policies of various parties and politicians will be scrutinised upside down and inside out. Nobody will buy the rubbish from the Tánaiste. A number of schools in my area were the subject of announcements in 2002, 2007 and 2011. They have been moved to the next instalment of the schools building programme but I do not buy it.

The debate surrounding the facilitation of the debate on the Finance Bill in the House this week has been somewhat besmirched by ill-informed and ignorant comment from some people, namely Sinn Féin. It is an appalling vista that the leader of that party, who is contesting for a seat in County Louth, is as economically ignorant as someone not in any way attached to politics or economics. It is frightening that someone would make statements with regard to pulling out of Europe at this juncture in the Irish economy. We are dependent on Europe at this time for our loan, although there is scope to renegotiate the penal interest rate. For any party or politician to advocate leaving Europe when we need it most is daft.