Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 1:

In page 3, between lines 8 and 9, to insert the following: “ “Act of 2010” means the Social Welfare and Pensions Act 2010;”.

The Minister is welcome back to the House. I acknowledge her as a decent and hard-working Minister who has done a great deal for this country since the pandemic hit and before it in her previous ministerial roles.What I will say here is about the issue and not the individual Minister in charge. I need to put this on the record because I realise she must have worked 23 hours a day over the past several months to keep the people of this country in the welfare entitlements they have.

What I am speaking about today is class K PRSI. We are here today to pass the Social Welfare Bill 2020. When the first Irish social insurance scheme was set up in 1911, it was seen as a contract between the citizen and the State and not a commercial relationship. I ask the Minister at the outset whether this relationship has changed. Is it no longer a contract between the citizen and the State? It was based on very simple rules of entitlement based on contributions. It has remained so ever since, with the exception of one Bill, which provided for the introduction of class K PRSI for public office holders. That legislation was introduced at the height of an economic mess the country found itself in. It is my belief it was poorly thought out and it was, in some way, the Oireachtas tipping its hat to the hard-pressed citizens of the State who were forced to bail out the State from an economic mess, which was overseen by this House at the time, through reckless carry-on and by reckless banks.

I am not going to go into the historical side of what happened between 2007 and 2011, when the legislation was introduced, but a lot of legislation was introduced at the time, including FEMPI legislation, that was reactionary. It hit the hardest pressed in society and people suffered badly. We might say those involved in the Oireachtas at the time, and I was not, did not really suffer that much as a result of class K PRSI being imposed on us. At 4% of salary, the least we might do was make the same contributions as every citizen of the State to the social welfare system. However, bringing us into the PRSI net using class K PRSI was, for me, a significant and almost seismic shift in the policy of the Government at the time.

In 2018, councillors were removed from the net and put into class S PRSI, which is for the self-employed. This is a bit of a nonsense because they are not self-employed. It was done because I took action to ensure councillors would be treated properly by the State. They became beneficiaries of the class S PRSI. It is deeply regrettable it was not retrospectively applied to them because many of them have suffered problems with their old age pensions and with entitlements to various benefits but we will move on.

As it stands, class K PRSI is arbitrary. It became a class of PRSI specifically for Oireachtas Members, judges, and the President, apart from unearned income of people with stocks and shares. It created an anomaly on top of an existing anomaly. Thankfully for the sake of councillors, the movement to class S changed things for them. We never thought about Members of the Oireachtas. The State is the employer of Members of the Oireachtas and has a duty of care to them. Not every Member is fortunate to have a double job. Indeed, in my case when I came into the Oireachtas, I was forced under statutory instrument to take a career break from my job as a teacher. The only professions forced into a career break on taking a seat in the Oireachtas are teachers and lecturers in institutes of technology. At that time, I took a hit in salary from the top of the teacher salary rate down to €65,000 a year. It was a pay cut of approximately €8,500 but I was damned delighted to take it because I am extremely proud to have been elected to the House on three occasions and I regard it as a tremendous privilege to be here.

Following the 2020 general election, something happened that brought focus to the impact of class K PRSI. A number of our former colleagues, some of them extremely hard-working high-profile people, lost their seats having only been in this establishment for one term. Let us couple this with the unforeseen prospect of a pandemic that hit the State. By the way, all of us in the House might as well be honest and admit from the outset that when people lose their seats, there is a severance payment. It is a small amount for somebody who has only served one term, and the entitlement to a pension as an Oireachtas Member, contrary to public opinion, is not until people reach the age of 55. Young Deputies and Senators in their early 30s who lost their seats suddenly found themselves in a situation where they had to go to the Intreo office to sign on. When they went there, they found they had no entitlement to unemployment benefit, despite having paid 4% of their salary to the insurance fund every month while they sat in this House. As reckonable employment contributions are now averaged over a lifetime, we have placed these former Members in a second peril, which is we have permanently damaged their entitlement to their contributory old age pension. When the time comes they will find they have a four-year gap and that will impact their entitlement to a pension.

The chilling effect of class K PRSI is not only monetary. It also has broader implications for democracy, equality and diversity in political representation. The lessons learned by those who have lost their seats is that if ordinary-type employees paying their PRSI are fortunate enough to get elected to this House and have no other income, they had better think twice before they take their seats. If they lose their seats they will not just lose their income but also their entitlement to benefits. From this point of view, it directly impacts democracy and the way democracy works.. Are we turning the Houses of the Oireachtas into a place for the privileged in society who are well-heeled and able to afford to come in here as a second job? Are we turning the Oireachtas into a place where somebody who is already extremely wealthy can come in and contribute to legislation? I hope not. I hope this House represents all of the citizens of the State, with all of the diversity that exists in the State and all of the poverty that exists in the State. I expect this is the way the House should operate.

We have gender quotas to encourage the election of women at national level. While they are sitting Members, they pay PRSI but it gives them no entitlement to benefits while they are here or after they leave. This is particularly important when we speak about women. Class K represents a serious barrier to the participation in politics of women and the unemployed and low paid of both sexes. If this persists there is a grave danger that participation in politics will become the preserve of the wealthy, those with jobs on the side and other external sources of income. This is not what we want as a nation. It is not what we want from our national Parliament. We are trying to move away from this. I compliment the Minister's party on the introduction of quotas to ensure we tried to create a level playing pitch. We still have a long way to go but we have tried to do this. It is tremendous to see the Minister as a female in the role. It is wonderful and it is a testament not only to her own skills and expertise but to the fact we have moved forward a small piece as a society.

The issue of the lack of maternity leave is in the news at present following the good news of the Minister for Justice, Deputy McEntee. I am delighted for her and I am sorry she is not here to congratulate her. It is great news. It is the first pregnancy in a House. I know from a woman's point of view it is full of trepidation and excitement. From my point of view, I remember when our first child was born I was totally and utterly wondering what the hell was going on.When the child was born, God bless her, I just could not understand that I had to change nappies as I did not do that sort of thing. I learned these skills.

The truth of the matter is that if one of the Deputies or Senators who lost their seats was fortunate enough to get a job and would now be a year into their job, their social welfare record would be broken. Their entitlement to maternity leave is gone.

While I am talking about maternity leave, I must express my absolute disgust at the political system in this country that does not have in place a system whereby a woman who has delivered a child is entitled to the same career opportunities as any other occupation in society. They should be able to take their maternity leave and we should have in place a system - which we put in place very quickly for the pandemic - that one can have virtual and remote meetings. There is no reason a Deputy, Senator or Minister who has just had a child should not be able to observe the operation of the House, whichever Chamber we are talking about, from home and cast her vote from there. God Almighty, it is not a great deal to ask for.

Thankfully, we only had two children, as I do not think I would have been able for any more. However, I saw my wife struggle between career and children and no matter how helpful I was, my wife always felt that she had to carry a bigger load than any other member of the family. Most women here would probably agree with me that they carry a bigger load. Certainly, we men can feed children and can learn to change nappies and things like that, but at the end of the day it is not the same as having to recover after a nine-month period and after the trauma of delivering a child. I have seen first time mothers lying beside a cradle in order to ensure that if the child woke up they would be able to meet the needs of the child. I know this as I have eight sisters and thankfully all of them have been able to produce children. It is totally and utterly unacceptable to expect a woman to be in here in Leinster House, in the Dáil, the Seanad or a council chamber within a day of delivering a child.

To return to class K PRSI, it is not popular and I will win no accolades in this country for defending Members of the Oireachtas and their entitlement to welfare payments. Nobody will thank me for that. Quite frankly, I do not give a continental damn. What I do care about is that we have an equal system across the working population of this country, irrespective of who or what one is. If there is an entitlement there, one should have it. We have an obligation to look after anyone paying class K PRSI in this House who has no other employment when they come to retire, if they do not qualify for a full Oireachtas pension. I will not qualify for one because we brought in the Single Pension Act, which again militates against people who move from one career into another. It is a simple thing to repeal this. I agree wholeheartedly that we should pay PRSI. I will work with anybody to ensure that Members of this House pay it but we need to be aware of the fact that not everybody is privileged enough to have a second job or to stay in this House long enough to earn a full pension from the House. I am the first person to say that anyone who has a full pension from the Oireachtas should walk out of here and be damn thankful to have that because there are so many people out there who do not have that.

Equality and everything that the social contributions system stands for must be respected by this House, and not just for the people outside this House but for all people. I am asking the Minister to accept my amendment. I am sorry for speaking on and on about it but it is vitally important. For those former Members who lost seats, some of whom are probably watching this today, I am deeply sorry that they find themselves in a situation that they have had to go to social welfare for assistance or for supplementary welfare because they do not have enough to live on. Remember, the lump sum that they received when they left here lasted a very short time and we are now over a year into a pandemic. I thank the Leas-Chathaoirleach for his time.