Darragh O'Brien (Fianna Fail)

I am pleased to be back. I look forward to the upcoming session. In the last session the Seanad made a great deal of progress in terms of how it does its business. I commend the Leader of the House, the leaders of the other groups and all Members on that. I hope this afternoon's question and answer session will be fruitful. Many valid questions will be asked. We will see what the answers will be like. I raised a specific issue with the Leader on a number of occasions during the debate on the Finance (No. 2) Bill 2011, which brought the jobs initiative into force, in effect. The initiative was paid for by means of the imposition of a levy on the private pension funds of people who saved for their retirement, as they were told to do by successive Governments. The current Government has seen fit to take €1.8 billion from such people to pay for its jobs initiative. The number of jobs created under the initiative will not be monitored. I am dubious about whether the VAT decreases provided for in the initiative have been passed on to consumers.

Earlier this afternoon, our leader met annuitants from Tara Mines who receive an average pension of €10,000 per annum, which is substantially less than most public service pensions. These people have been notified by the scheme trustees that their pensions will be reduced from €10,000 to €9,000 per annum because the scheme is under-funded and unable to pay the pensions levy introduced by the Government. I raised another pension scheme - the retired airline workers scheme, which has 15,000 members - in the House previously. This scheme is under-funded, like 80% of Irish pension schemes, and will simply not be able to pay the pension levy. The only way it would be able to do so would be if it were to reduce the benefits to be paid to its annuitants. The incomes of those who are outside Leinster House today have been cut by 10% to pay for VAT decreases from which many of this country's major newspapers will benefit. The question of whether this measure will create a single job is not being monitored. Certainly, this side of the House will be questioning the Minister, Deputy Bruton, who I am glad is coming in, vigorously about how we can bring in a jobs initiative, which was previously to be a jobs budget, and then not track whether it is achieving results. I can tell the House those in the Tara Mines and aviation pension schemes know well the impact of this jobs initiative because their pensions have been cut by 10%.

On the three year fiscal plan, I welcome the fact that the Government has decided to publish a plan to show people where there will be tax increases and expenditure cuts to try to give them some degree of certainty as to what is coming down the track. I assume and ask that this would be debated in this House.

Does the commitment still stand that the Government will not raise income taxes and not cut social welfare in the forthcoming budget? Over recent weeks, the Taoiseach and Tánaiste seem to have rowed back quite a degree on their pronouncements of the 100 days in Government. Can the Leader tell me today that the Government remains committed to no income tax increases and no social welfare cuts in the forthcoming budget?

It is the first day back and we are not too restricted by time.