Jerry Buttimer (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire, go mórmhór ós rud é gurb í seo an chéad uair dó Bille Airgeadais a chur os comhair an tSeanaid.

I welcome the Minister to the House on the first occasion he has appeared here with a Finance Bill. We recognise the important progress we have made in the economic fortunes of our country. As the Minister rightly said in his opening remarks, this is about improving the living standards of our citizens along with our competitiveness. It is important to acknowledge that we have made gargantuan progress as a country. It is incumbent upon us now as Members of the Oireachtas to ensure that we do not go back to the days of boom and bloom or boom and bust. Senator Boyhan is smiling at me. We remember Deputy Marc MacSharry's famous use of the former phrase. We can never go back to those days.

As part of our fiscal responsibility it is important to recognise that there are a cohort of people who require our support as a State. I refer in particular to special needs education, special needs provision and respite care. In distributing the largesse of the €17 billion health budget, it is important to provide for parents and for adults with severe and profound disability, who I believe are becoming a group forgotten by the State.

Equally, the measures the Minister has introduced in the Finance Bill 2018 to promote and incentivise work are to be welcomed. Yesterday, Senator Colm Burke and I attended a number of announcements in Cork. At the Dublin dinner of the Cork Chamber of Commerce last week there was a very supportive atmosphere and commentary on what the Minister and the Government are doing to realise the benefits of a growing economy. It has become a hackneyed phrase or cliché but it should not be. In this Brexit era, it is important that we look beyond the short term and the narrow focus of some. The prism that the Minister has adopted is one of responsibility, which is one to which we all subscribe.

Senator Colm Burke referred to housing. We had the same conversation with the same person yesterday. Some of the public criticism of the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, is very unfair. It is not motivated by the desire to help find solutions but by attempts to score cheap political points. I know I am digressing, but look at the urban regeneration fund announced yesterday. It baffled me that in Cork's Evening Echoyesterday evening, there was not a scintilla of a line about the urban regeneration fund, which has the potential to be transformative not just for Cork city but for its periphery, the metropolitan areas around Passage West and Carrigaline.

I will finish on this point. In the last paragraph of the Minister's speech he made reference to betting duty. I must digress again for a second. The Minister has spoken before about gaming and gambling and about loot boxes. I raised a Commencement matter with the Minister of State at the Department of Justice and Equality, Deputy Stanton. I have had the pleasure of working with a young man, Mr. Eoin Barry, who has met the Minister of State and others.Although it is not addressed in the Bill, the Minister is making changes to betting duty. In time, we must look at the issue of loot boxes.

I commend the Minister on the work he is doing and his stewarding of the economy.