Kathryn Reilly (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I am sure Enda is shaking in his boots. Having started on a good note, I am also glad that we had the opportunity to address the House today on the economic statement, although my contribution may not be as positive as that of some Senators here this evening. I am sure the Minister of State will have expected that.

As highlighted by my colleagues in the other House, the economic statement is being used to ask people to forgive and forget. It is asking people to forget about the cuts they have faced in child benefit, carer's allowance and lone parent payments. There have been reductions in the salaries of young teachers, nurses and gardaí. There have been cuts to rural services. They are being asked to forget the imposition of the austerity measures over the past number of years. It is asking the people to forgive the Government for cutting young people's welfare payments and to forget that this in itself partly contributed to a surge in emigration among young people.

It is asking people to forget that more than 20% of jobs are now low paid and that many workers are poorer now than they were before. It is asking us to forget that 450,000 people are on waiting lists as a result of the accident and emergency crisis and to forgive the failing to make any real inroads into reducing waiting lists and waiting times. Despite promises to end the scandal of patients on trolleys, there is no sign of this problem being resolved. We are asked to forget that too. We are being asked to forget that we nationalised our banks and to forgive these banks, which we saved, when they do not pass on lower interest rates to mortgage holders.

The Government has failed to meet some of the claims it made for itself on coming into office. In the stability programme update issued in April 2011, it said that the economy would grow by 8.7% from 2012 to 2014.It was, however, little more than half of that figure, at 4.7%, because some policies had had the effect of slowing the economy. That is the truth behind the talk of recovery. The recovery, in large part, has come from the overseas sector, exports and net financial flows from overseas. It is widely accepted that some of this involves an element of financial chicanery and accounting practices that might be designed to avail of low taxation rates here, but little of it has to do with the real economy.

Last week the Minister for Finance made the bold claim in his contribution in the Dáil on the spring economic statement that our young emigrants would come back. However, the facts tell a different story. The number of new graduates emigrating is actually higher than at any time in the previous six years. Only several weeks ago over 7,000 young Irish citizens aged between 18 and 35 years snapped up Canadian work visas in only a couple of minutes. It is also worth noting that in recent studies emigrants identified four key barriers to their return. They are poor infrastructure, precarious working conditions and low pay - it is not just the availability of jobs but the types of job available - a lack of career opportunities and progression and the lack of affordable housing. There was nothing in the spring economic statement that addressed these barriers in a meaningful way to allow these emigrants to come back to live, raise families and pursue careers here.

There are 61,000 fewer people aged between 20 and 34 years in employment since 2011. The number in employment fell by 14,000 in 2014 alone. The level of employment in the west fell by 4,800 in the year to December 2014 and by 5,000 in the south west. This is a similar story in the Border region where the number in employment has fallen by 1,300. The reality is that there is a two-tier recovery. While we can talk about positive economic figures, the recovery is not giving an advantage to all people. Many are being left behind, which is manifesting itself in discontent and people's reactions and protests to, say, water charges. We cannot have a two-tier recovery because it will only be broken and not for everyone.