Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I do not want to labour the point but north of the Border where the Senator's party has been in government for a long time, the period is 28 weeks. All I am saying is that this is a very modest extension. In the Netherlands it is two years and in the UK it is 28 weeks. The conditionality applying has become much tougher, as I am sure the Senator knows from his colleagues in government in the North. We have a very generous sick pay arrangement. We have very generous rates of payment, significantly in excess of anything in Newry, Belfast or Derry. We are a country where understandably all of the parties emphasise a compassionate and generous social welfare system but it is a system that has to be paid out of the taxation of everybody who is in work and their PRSI contributions. We have had an unprecedented collapse of our banks. We have to fund savings and find savings in the system while maintaining the integrity of its core base. In the jurisdiction in which the Senator's party has been in power for a long period of time, his party could have emphasised reforms in this area but it has been happy to stay with 28 weeks. I have never heard it say a word against it. Not only that, but I have spoken to employers in the North who support the Senator's party and they have told me they do not have a problem with 28 weeks because they consider that it assists the efficiency of the management by employers of problems relating to illnesses.

They have told me they do not have a problem with 28 weeks because they consider that it assists the efficiency of the management by employers of problems relating to illnesses. I offer that as an observation. We are doing this in a considered way. We are providing a backdrop for people who are in need of supplementary welfare assistance. That is an infinitely better situation than it is north of the Border with 28 weeks.