Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I dtús báire, tá botún le réiteach. There is a typographical error that the Minister will address.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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Gabhaim buíochas leis an Leas-Cheann Comhairle. I wish to draw Deputies' attention to a minor typographical error that my Department has noted in the Bill on page 161, line 14. A reference has been inadvertently labelled “89A(ii) of (iii)” rather than the correct version of “89A(ii) or (iii)”. I seek to invoke Dáil Standing Order 196 to request that the Leas-Cheann Comhairle direct the Clerk to make a correction in the Bill so as to correct the reference to “89A(ii) or (iii)” in this location, if that can be agreed.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I hereby direct the Clerk to incorporate the changes as requested.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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I move amendment No. 1:

In page 9, between lines 18 and 19, to insert the following: “ “investment undertaking” includes a retail credit firm as defined in section 28 of the Central Bank Act 1997 and any other person who owns credit which is being serviced by a credit servicer as defined in section 28(2) of that Act.”.

I am very concerned about the lack of time allowed for this debate. While I know there is a big event taking place, that does not give the Government impunity to enact this Bill with such indecent haste and without teasing out the many matters. This amendment is important. The former Minister, Michael Noonan, invited the vulture funds to Ireland. It is high time that someone uninvited them and sent them home because they have caused plunder and pillage. There is an old song about plunder and pillage in Van Diemen's Land. It is unbelievable what the vulture funds have got away with at that time. They should never have been here. I will use a parallel, although I hate using it because it is very cruel. My son is a sheep farmer and when little lambs are born, grey crows and vultures come down and take their tongues and eyes savagely. The very word "vulture" is anathema to any right-thinking person. Vulture funds are not interested in supporting the Irish people or anything else.

I hope the Government will accept this amendment, although I have doubts. The amendment would ensure some bit of respect, manners and common decency are put in around the rules of engagement. Every taxpayer and citizen in this country has to do a tax return but the vulture funds are immune to all of that. Why should they be? People’s dreams are being shattered by what has happened to them. They borrowed in good faith to house themselves, buy a bit of land or go into business, which is what we need. We need entrepreneurs and people who are able to house themselves, rather than putting the law about ag lorg aid and help. They want to do this for themselves and their families and to provide a roof over their heads. Their debt is sold off by the pillar banks and other banks such as Ulster Bank - I could name all the banks - to the vulture funds for a fraction. In many cases, people wanted to pay the debt but it was unceremoniously disposed of and they were then left at the mercy of the vulture funds.

As for the Land Registry, which is located trasna na habhann, across the river, it is completely inept and totally out of order in how it deals with the proper ownership of the title of most of the places. In 90% of cases in which homes, farms and businesses are being repossessed, the Land Registry is way out of line. Barristers are going into courts on behalf of the vulture funds waving pieces of paper at the justices but the judges are not asking them whether it is legal. It is not legal. I could quote Edmund Honohan, the highly respected former Master of the High Court, in this regard. I also welcome to the House Theo McDonald who did a wonderful analysis on this issue in the McDonald report, but the Minister, who is a new Minister, does not want to hear that either. I am very disappointed.

Vulture funds are investment entities which purchase distressed debt at a discount, often from struggling companies or individuals. They then seek to profit by collecting the full value of the debt, sometimes through aggressive and unethical tactics. Credit services are intermediaries and manage these debts. There is no mercy in the courts. I have yet to see cases, except for a couple of judgments, in which these merciless vulture funds were delayed.

One of the points on which we feel very strongly in the context of this amendment is the issue of tax evasion. Vulture funds often use credit services to avoid paying taxes by operating through these intermediaries. They can shift profits offshore to minimise their tax liabilities. This deprives our country of much-needed revenue that could be used for badly needed public services. I cannot understand why the Government has na súile dúnta, its eyes closed, to this since the crash in 2009 and has not brought the vulture funds to book. Why is it beholden to them?

There is a cosy cartel of consultancy firms. The Government uses many of these firms for every kind of a report and investigation. The same consultancy firms and accountants are advising these merciless vulture funds on how to utilise tax loopholes. They are all in it together.

The ordinary people of Ireland, for whom the men of 1916, 1921, 1922 and 1923 fought in order to have democracy in Ireland, have been abandoned. People's lives are being lost. So many people have taken their own lives, so many families have been destroyed, so many marriages have broken up and there is so much ill health and so many mental health issues, it is unbelievable. The Minister is hearing this gach lá. He must be hearing it, as must his backbenchers. Yet, he comes in here and lets the vulture funds off scot-free. It is grossly immoral, unethical and unfair to allow these vulture funds to operate with such impunity.

I thank the iar-Sheanadóir, Brian Ó Domhnaill, for undertaking the research on policy, with help from Edmund Honohan and others. I also congratulate him on the sporting prowess he has shown and his recent achievements in education.

As I said, vulture funds are known for their aggressive tactics in collecting debts. They often target vulnerable borrowers using legal threats and other pressure tactics to exact payments. This can lead to significant financial and emotional distress. Think of the children. While Deputy Chambers was not the Minister for Finance at the time, there were many cases in which mercenaries from other countries came to Ireland to inflict and carry out evictions without proper legal work. We have seen their vehicles being parked in Balbriggan Garda Station. We have seen what happened in Roscommon. We have seen this all over the country. These people have no business in this country. They are not even registered security people and they are causing bedlam and injury. They are causing people to perish. We thought we got rid of those tactics when we got rid of the oppressive regime that was here for many hundreds of years.

The economic aspect is totally unchecked. The operation of the vulture funds can have a broader economic impact. By focusing on short-term profits, they can destabilise companies and economies, leading to job losses and economic instability. It is as clear as the nose on your face that this can happen. It beggars belief.

Let us look at some real-life examples to understand the human impact. Humans and humanity must be what every Teachta Dála and Seanadóir is about. The practices used are awful. For example, Pepper Finance is one of the most notorious services in Ireland. It has been involved in several high-profile cases in which borrowers have been charged exorbitant interest rates. For instance, a couple in Cork sued Pepper Finance over an excessive interest rate of 8.5% on their mortgage, which was significantly higher than the rate they would have paid if their loan had remained with the original lender. In business, I sign a lot of agreements for the purchase of vehicles. While we need finance houses to support business, if people sign an agreement with some institution, surely their contract is with it and should not be sold on to these merciless vulture funds which are here to make massive profits and do not care about the collateral damage. As I said, that is one case but there are many others.

Some 100,000 mortgages in Ireland have been sold to vulture funds, leaving families, sometimes extended families, in awful situations.

Borrowers are trapped in high-interest loans with little recourse. These "mortgage prisoners" are often unable to refinance or switch to more favourable terms, leading to financial hardship. Some 700,000 people have mortgages, of which 100,000 are with vulture funds. That is an enormous number to be with vulture funds. It is time we got rid of them. The Minister has a golden opportunity in the last hours of this dying Dáil, before an election is called, to do something meaningful for the people out there, many of whom are the enablers who provide employment or who set up their own businesses and took a punt. We need those people to take a gamble. They do not all have cosy positions in the public service. Then there are the others who tried to house themselves and borrowed and have been badly stung. They cannot get any finance from any source because they feature in the credit bureau.

There are significant gaps in the regulatory framework that allow vulture funds and their credit services to operate with minimal oversight. The lack of stringent regulations and enforcement has enabled these entities to exploit borrowers and avoid accountability. That is shocking. We are reminded of 2010, and we found out about that, but now it is 2024 and they are still exploiting the gaps and still using every kind of loophole, whether legal or illegal, as regards the land registry.

The Government's economic policies have often favoured financial institutions and investment funds over ordinary citizens. How can that be right in our so-called land of milk and honey? It is our duty as Teachtaí Dála, messengers of the people, to serve our Irish people and not be kowtowing to vulture funds, which have no interest here. They will be gone like snow off a ditch from this country when they have reaped all their gains, blood money in many cases. It is taken wrong. They have so many undertakings and they must be sorted out. The guidance notes refer to a collective investment vehicle, such as a UCIT. The amendment inserts a definition of "investment undertaking" that fits this context. It is plain and simple. It is beyond time we called these vulture funds to book and tried to save more lives and more families. They cost our health service because of the illness and the depraved manner in which they operate. The Minister's advisers are here again, and some of the big financial houses in this country are insisting that he keep this policy. They are also, on the other hand, working for these vulture funds. That is totally wrong and reprehensible. The citizens, or the borrowers, are way down the food chain. They are last, whether they be householders or businesspeople.

I know we do not have much time. I could say an awful lot more, but the message is simple. I ask the Minister to accept this amendment and, at this late stage, the horse having bolted many years ago, for the sake of the future generations of families, try to bring some order to this Wild West that has been allowed to operate here in dealing with finances. No other sector or businessperson or whatever can operate without being under the strict regime of Revenue and taxation laws. Why should we allow these people to get off scot-free?

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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Obviously, we are all waiting for the whistle to be blown in terms of the election. In my time in these Houses, I think this is the 18th Finance Bill I have responded to. Even during the time of the IMF bailout, there was agreement to get the Finance Bill through the House. This guillotine is not appropriate. There are sections in this legislation which will not see the light of day in terms of scrutiny. There were major mistakes that the Minister is closing down in this Bill. For example, his predecessor, Deputy Paschal Donohoe, left a loophole in the Bill in terms of pensions whereby millions of euro were funnelled out of companies into pension funds. I pointed that out to him at the time and he ignored it, as did his predecessor, the Minister, Michael McGrath, when I raised it in a Topical Issue earlier this year, and now this is being closed down in this Bill. I raise that because it is important that we have proper scrutiny of this legislation.

A lot of important pieces of our tax law are being dealt with, including major issues such as pillar 1 and pillar 2 of the OECD BEPS agreement. There are also issues that, as I have mentioned before, the Minister has never even mentioned on the floor of the Dáil. In my time dealing with 18 different Finance Bills, never has there been legislation that granted an income tax reduction of €320,000 to an individual. That is what is contained in this Bill through the Minister's changes to the standard fund threshold, where individuals who already have golden pension pots of €2 million will, as a result of the measures the Minister is introducing, between now and 2028, be able to avail of a pension tax cut of €320,000. Very few people in society will be able to benefit from that. The report the Minister published suggests that only those in the public sector who earn €170,000, which would be Ministers, taoisigh and so on, would benefit from this tax reduction the Government signed off on. It is appalling that it has done that and it is unlikely that the measure will get any serious scrutiny.

There are other issues with this Bill. In section 36, for example, the Government doubles down on the landlords' credit. There is a tax cut of €120 million for landlords at a time when the Minister is being told by Barra Roantree that it is the stupidest tax cut ever "against stiff competition". This is a professor, who has made this point over and over again. Yet this is Fianna Fáil again doing what Fianna Fáil does, and it is very clear in this legislation that there are very clear winners. Yes, there are bits and pieces for others, but those bits and pieces are hundreds of euro here and there. The real winners - let us call a spade a spade - are the people with pension pots of more than €2 million. They win under Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. They win the lotto in this legislation. They get a tax cut of €320,000 as a result of this legislation. The landlords win in this legislation. They shared a tax reduction of €120 million, despite the Minister's officials telling him that this will leave half of landlords in the State paying no tax.

As a previous speaker said, it is also the funds that win. The funds continue to win under Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, and no wonder. Let us just look at the statistics. On a day when the Government released new targets that are abysmally low, let us look at what has happened over the last five years. Why does it happen? It happens because it is contained in the Finance Bills that have been passed over the years. We see that last year 6,203 apartments were bought by funds. That is four times what was being bought by these funds before this Government came into office four years ago. Before Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael came into office on that occasion, there were four times fewer purchases of apartments by funds. It is not just that Noonan rolled out the red carpet; the present Government basically said, "Party on, guys, and you snap up the building going on here." Over half of all apartments in this State in 2023 were bought by funds. Those are the facts. There were 741 apartments bought the year before Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil entered government together. What is the number today? It is 846. It went up by just over a miserable 100 apartment units. Why is that? It is because the funds have increased their grip by nearly 5,000 additional apartments.

That is what is happening, and that is what is contained in the Bill. That is what the Government will vote for when it votes against these amendments, when we say to the Government that it is not fair that those funds, which are charging eye-watering rents in the Minister's city of Dublin, and elsewhere, pay no tax whatsoever in that rental role, that when they dispose of an asset they do not pay capital gains tax on the disposal of that asset and that the effective tax rate is minimal. The Government will say it will increase stamp duty on bulk purchases but it does not apply to apartments because in Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael's little world, apartments are not homes. Funds, however, are not just buying apartments; they are also buying other homes.

The numbers I have put on the record relate to apartments only. Although the funds are continuing to snap up many hundreds of homes every year, the Minister has come forward with the pathetic increase in stamp duty and has said it will stamp it out. It will not. If the Minister really wanted to stamp it out, he would not be saying the increase will bring in revenue. The only way it can bring in revenue is through the funds paying the additional tax. We do not want their tax. We do not want them to be bulk-purchasing homes from under the noses of first-time buyers. That is the problem with guillotining this legislation and, more important, with the legislation in the first instance.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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To speak about the amendment tabled, the specific wording proposed by the Deputies would have no effect if incorporated into the Finance Bill. For this reason, I cannot accept it. The proposed amendment is to section 1, which provides for the meaning of words in Part 1. Inserting a definition here does not change the meaning of words in the Taxes Consolidation Act 1997 and, as such, the proposed amendment does not change the operation of this Act.

My officials followed up with the Deputies’ offices following receipt of the proposed amendment with a view to understanding the intended policy outcome. I understand that their proposals may relate to credit servicing firms involved in servicing portfolios of residential loans, including mortgage loans. Any entity that services credit under a mortgage agreement entered into by a consumer falls within the regulatory remit of the Central Bank. Any entity that holds the legal title to credit granted under a credit agreement with a borrower is also subject to the regulatory oversight of the Central Bank. Accordingly, the full legislative and consumer protection framework covers all borrowers, whether their mortgages are managed by a credit servicer or by entities that purchase the legal rights of the creditor under mortgage agreements. This means that where a creditor sells or assigns its legal rights under a credit agreement to another creditor, the consumer protections that were available to borrowers prior to such a transaction remain in place. There is a range of measures to protect consumers who have a mortgage, including the various Central Bank statutory codes of conduct, such as the consumer protection code and the code of conduct on mortgage arrears.

With regard to tax returns, as referred to here, all companies that run a taxable business in Ireland must file an annual tax return with the Revenue Commissioners. As part of that tax return, many companies are required to provide full financial statements in iXBRL format, and the Revenue Commissioners can request full financial statements from those that do not have this filing requirement. There are also long-standing provisions in tax law that place a reporting obligation on a person in receipt of income of more than €3,810 on behalf of another person and under which a non-resident can be charged tax in the name of an agent in the State who carries on the business of that non-resident. The Revenue Commissioners have advised me that where any information required by them is not disclosed in the tax return or financial statements, they have sufficient powers to request the production of any appropriate books or records to satisfy them as to the accuracy of any tax return.

I recognise the difficulties faced by borrowers experiencing difficulty in repaying their mortgages. The tax and expenditure measures in budget 2025 are designed to assist in dealing with increased costs of living. It is encouraging to note that the overall level of mortgage arrears continues to decline and the number of principal home mortgage accounts in long-term arrears at the end of June was a little over 20,000, down from 30,000 in December 2020. The Government has always advocated for the broadest regulatory and consumer protection regime possible and will continue to do so.

Where a loan is sold, the terms and conditions will not change and the rights and obligations of all parties to the mortgage agreement will remain unchanged. I set that out in the context of what Deputy McGrath has asked about. There is a robust framework in place to protect people dealing with issues such as mortgage arrears. The code of conduct on mortgage arrears, CCMA, forms part of the Central Bank’s consumer protection framework and is a key part of the Central Bank’s mortgage arrears framework. The CCMA must be complied with under the law and the Central Bank has the power to take enforcement action against any regulated entity that does not act in compliance with it. The Central Bank continues to supervise compliance with the CCMA and will investigate any issues that arise, including patterns of behaviour that suggest the code is not being followed.

The objective of the statutory code is to ensure regulated entities have fair and transparent processes in place for dealing with borrowers in or facing mortgage arrears. Due regard must be given to the facts of each case, and each needs to be considered on its own merit. Each regulated entity must consider the borrowers’ situations in the context of the solutions it provides, which solutions may differ from firm to firm. The CCMA requires lenders to exhaust the options available from the suite of alternative repayment arrangements offered by them before taking action that may result in follow-on consequences. The CCMA requires regulated entities to have an appeals process in place to enable a borrower to appeal a decision by a regulated entity, including where the borrower is not willing to enter into an alternative repayment arrangement or where the regulated entity declines to offer an alternative repayment arrangement. The appeals procedure must be such as to inform borrowers of their right to refer the matter to the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman.

On tax policy, there are no special tax rules related to credit services firms. As such, they are subject to the same taxation rules as any other company carrying on a business in Ireland. This includes the rules in relation to the calculation of profits and gain, the obligation to provide Revenue with financial statements and the obligations to make tax returns or return information in respect of income collected on behalf of third parties. As such, I am not in a position to accept the amendment.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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Can I take the Minister up on that? He has completely misled the Dáil again and I really need to ask him to stop doing that. He made the point that loans sold to vulture funds or credit servicing firms are subject to the same rights and entitlements when sold. We know that is not the case, and the FSPO is on record as saying it is not. There was a major loophole in the legislation in 2015. The Central Bank has said it is up to the Government to fix the loophole and to address the issue. The FSPO has made it clear that complaints that came to it were outside its scope because of the sale to the vulture funds. The Minister’s party allowed for the loans in question to be sold to the vulture funds. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael facilitated this and then left people high and dry when they went to the FSPO to deal with it.

I ask the Minister to respond to what I believe will be hurtful to people who have made complaints and found they could not be heard. He said the conditions and terms remain the same.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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An amendment has been made regarding the FSPO, as the Deputy is aware, in the context of what he has set out. The Government previously sought to correct this. I have set out the robust framework in place to protect people dealing with issues such as mortgage arrears. The CCMA forms part of the Central Bank’s consumer protection framework and is a central part of its overall mortgage arrears framework. I am talking about the present in the context of the FSPO’s powers. The CCMA must be complied with under the law. The Central Bank has the power to take enforcement action against any regulated entity that is not acting in compliance with it. The Central Bank continues to supervise compliance and will investigate any issues that arise, including patterns of behaviour that suggest the CCMA process is not being followed.

The objective of the CCMA, which is a statutory code, is to ensure regulated entities have fair and transparent processes in place for dealing with borrowers in or facing mortgage arrears. Due regard must be given to the fact that each case is unique and needs to be considered on its own merits, and each regulated entity must consider the borrowers’ situations in the context of the solutions it provides, which solutions may differ from firm to firm. The CCMA does not prescribe the solution that must be offered. It includes the requirement that alternative repayment arrangements must be appropriate and sustainable and based on a full assessment of the individual circumstances of the borrower. The CCMA requires the lender to exhaust all options available from the suite of alternative repayment arrangements offered by it before taking any action that may result in borrowers losing their homes. The CCMA requires regulated entities to have an appeals process in place to enable a borrower to appeal a decision by a regulated entity, including where the borrower is not willing to enter an alternative repayment arrangement or where the regulated entity declines to offer an alternative repayment arrangement. The appeals procedure must also inform borrowers of their right to refer the matter to the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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I need to pull up the Minister on his claim. He has not withdrawn it. Does he accept – he cannot but do so – that people who have had their loans sold to vulture funds currently do not have the same protections they would have if they had not been sold? Quite a large number of individuals do not. The Minister is in charge of the legislation that is supposed to stop this. It was me who pointed this out to his predecessor. The FSPO made the determinations. There is an amendment proposed but the Minister is not bringing the relevant legislation before the Dáil before the general election. That legislation will fall. Hundreds, if not thousands, of people who had their loans sold to the vulture funds, at the invitation of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, do not have the protection the Minister told the Dáil they would have.

They do not have the protection. The Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman told the Government they do not, the Central Bank told it they do not and that the Government has to fix it. The legislation is still not going through and a general election will be called within 48 to 72 hours.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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As the Deputy knows, the committee of which he is a member agreed to postpone the specific hearing on that to get legal advice. Everyone agrees there is a need to take action in the context of the FSPO and the amendment that is required and the Government has said that. That is why, what I have set out in the context of the CCMA, is the overall consumer protection code-----

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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They do not have the same protection.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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-----and what we have said is that the legislation is waiting for a date from the committee.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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No, the Minister said they had the same protection and he should withdraw that comment.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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I have set out the context on the CCMA, which is factually correct.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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It is not.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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On the CCMA, it is correct.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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The Minister made a point and I am telling him now that those who have gone to the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman have not done so for the good of their health. These are people who are in financial distress. He has stood there and said they have the same protection. He knows fine well they do not have the same protection because there is a major flaw with the legislation that he is supposed to fix. It has not been fixed and the Dáil is about to be dissolved. As that is simply factual, please do not insult people's intelligence and pretend that when the Government facilitated the sale to the vulture funds, the borrowers have the same protection; they do not. The Central Bank told the Minister that and the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman told him that.

They cannot investigate the complaints because of the legislation. It is important that the Minister withdraw the comments he made in the Dáil because it is insulting to people who are in that position and who are trying to go to the financial services ombudsman. They cannot do so because they are deemed outside of the reach of that ombudsman because, and only because, their loan was sold to a vulture fund within a certain period.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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I referenced the FSPO in the context of the appeal procedure and the fact they must inform borrowers of their right to refer the matter to them. That is the context in which I set out my remarks relating to the code of conduct and mortgage arrears. I have also set out that we agreed with the committee on the need to have an amendment and that was subject to legal advice. There was co-operation between the Government and the committee on that. That is what we sought to progress in the last period. The Government has said it is committed to bringing forward that amendment.

My comments relating to the FSPO related to what I set out on the CCMA requiring the regulated entities to have an appeals process-----

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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That is not the comment. That was not his comment.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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That was my reference-----

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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His comments were that the protections travelled with them. They are the comments that gave the green light to the vulture funds to sweep in and buy up these loans.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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For reference, I can set out what I stated, which related to the CCMA and the appeals procedure relating to it when it comes to borrowers referring the matter to them. We are on the record as saying what is required in the context of the amendment before the committee, where there is cross-party support for that.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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The Minister is also on the record as misleading the Dáil.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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The amendment has been formally moved. Is there anybody here to press that amendment? No, so the amendment falls.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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On section 2 of the Bill, which deals with the rate of charge in relation to USC, this is not the way the tax package should have been introduced and I will speak to this point more generally in respect of my own amendment. There absolutely was, however, a fairer way to do that. We in Sinn Féin have put on the record that if we have the opportunity to lead the next Government, we will exempt the first €45,000 of income that everybody in the State earns from the USC tax net. That means the average worker in the State will never have to pay the USC ever again under a Sinn Féin-led Government. That is the type of approach the Minister should have brought forward in this legislation and that measure should have been done in two steps. First, the threshold should have been set at €30,000 for the USC tax net and then moved to €45,000, which can be delivered within 18 months of a general election. That is something many people would welcome.

I refer to the effect of what the Minister has introduced in this section for somebody earning €30,000. I am mindful that the CSO tells us the average income in the State of all workers is €36,000 but if we exclude those who work seasonally or those who have to sign on in the summer months for different reasons, the median income is in the region of approximately €43,000. If we take the average of all workers, somebody on €30,000 would benefit through this section by €59. That is appalling and abysmal. If someone earns €40,000, they benefit by €159.

When I talked about the winners and losers, I said some people will get things out of this Bill and yes, some people will get €59 out of this Bill. If you are on €40,000, it will be €159. Compare that to the sections we probably will not even get to discuss. As I said, the people who run around with Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael and the people who have the gold-plated pensions will benefit. They will not benefit by €59 or €159 but will benefit to the tune of €320,000 as a tax cut. I am talking about the lowest-income workers, for whom the Minister could have done something meaningful. I ask the Minister, in respect of this legislation, what is the trajectory of USC?

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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On a point of order, are the amendments dealing with USC in the next section?

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I am not sure what section they are on but on this section, there are no amendments. There are no amendments on section 2 but Deputy Doherty wanted to speak to this section, which is perfectly in order.

Martin Browne (Tipperary, Sinn Fein)
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Workers have had it bad enough with the cost-of-living increases, rents and house prices, increased fuel costs and the LPT increases imposed by Government parties and others who choose to align themselves with the Government parties, such as Labour and some independent councillors in my own constituency. We need to see the abolition of USC for the workers whose means are not sufficient to adequately handle the cost of everyday life and the rising cost of essentials. The measures taken by the Government are insignificant in this regard and, as importantly, it does not recognise how the financial challenges facing people at the moment predominantly affect those on lower incomes.

Instead, the Government has chosen to avoid this basic fact in favour of those who have more ability to cushion themselves against any financial blows. That is why Sinn Féin will abolish USC for average workers by taking the first €45,000 of every worker's income out of USC. It would improve the conditions of 2 million workers who would not pay any more USC. That is why Sinn Féin has submitted a motion to get this Government to explore the option of abolishing USC for those earning €45,000 and under. Rather than ignoring those who are bearing the brunt of the financial challenges of everyday life, and we must remember USC is a legacy of Fianna Fáil crashing the economy, ordinary workers need a break from the consequences of the Government's actions.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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This section of the Bill amends section 531AN of the Taxes Consolidation Act 1997 to give effect to the two changes to the universal social charge that were announced in budget 2025. First, the ceiling of the second rate of USC, that is, the 2% rate, will increase to take account of the increase in the national minimum wage. It is increasing by 80 cent per hour, that is, from €12.70 per hour to €13.50 per hour, with effect from 1 January 2025. This continues the Government's policy of ensuring full-time workers on the minimum wage will remain outside the charge of the top rates of USC. Accordingly, the ceiling of the 2% USC rate band will increase by 6.3%, from €25,760 to €27,382 with effect from 1 January 2025. Second, the 4% rate of USC will be reduced to 3%. This represents the second consecutive reduction to this rate. This change will benefit all those earning over €27,382 in 2025. The cost of this USC package is €470 million in 2025 and €540 million in a full year.

Taken together with the income tax changes, which are provided for in section 3 and which we will speak about shortly, these changes will support low and middle-income earners and builds on the progress already made in recent budgets. Taking account of the cumulative USC changes over the lifetime of this Government, the 2% ceiling band has been increased by 34%, or by €6,898 from €20,484 to €27,382.

The USC middle rate has also been reduced by 1.5 percentage points from 4.5% to 3%. Let us take the wider changes we have seen in the context of a single person employee and their average effective tax rate. In 2020, a person on €25,000 was paying 12.4%; in 2025, 9.4% will be their average effective tax rate. Someone on €35,000 was paying 17.1%; next year that will be 14.4%. Someone on €40,000 was paying 20.9% in 2020 and will pay 16% in 2025. These are clearly progressive changes. Reducing the income tax burden and the USC have been central to what this Government has designed and delivered in the context of our overall tax package and this reduction in USC will be important in the overall tax people pay in 2025 and it is a welcome change.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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What happened to Fianna Fáil's promise before the last election that it was going to abolish the USC? Its members will go out canvassing on the doors again and make more promises. What credibility do they think they can have with people? Fianna Fáil and other parties promised they would abolish it. I remember when it was, to quote the late Albert Reynolds, "a temporary little arrangement". It was a temporary tax that came in after the reckless behaviour allowed to carry on by the Fianna Fáil Government. I was a backbencher in it, I am ashamed to say. It was reckless and this was a punitive tax put on every man, woman and child. I know some lower income people have been taken out of the tax bracket, but what does this make of the commitments they will give to people in their manifesto? They might as well have a bit of toilet paper as a manifesto when they do not have any credibility or integrity or honesty to live up to the promises they make to people. You can fool some of the people some of the time, but if you fool all of the people all of the time, it is a serious situation for our democracy. The Minister did not make those promises, but his party leader and the party he is a member of did, as did the Government in which he was a Minister of State. They think they can pass the Bill with a small bit of tinkering around it to save a bit of face. It is not acceptable or good enough. A supposedly temporary tax was put on all those years ago, and this punitive tax has become part of the mechanism of getting tax from ordinary hardworking people trying to survive and live and pay their debts and bills and educate their families. It is a shame.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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What is the Minister's view of middle income? He talked about middle-income workers and all the rest. Will he clarify to the House his definition of "middle income"? Does he use CSO data for example, which tells us that the median income in 2023 was €43,221? I am sure people would accept that definition of "middle income". However, as the CSO tells us, that excludes everybody who works fewer than 50 weeks. There are people in all of our constituencies, whether they are the school caretaker or otherwise, who do not work 50 weeks due to the nature of their employment. When all employment is taken into account, the average weekly earning is €699. Therefore, if that were annualised, it would be €36,400. That is the CSO data. It tells us that the average weekly earnings of all workers are €36,400. If we just take workers who work at least 50 weeks per year, then it is €43,221. That excludes a lot of workers as I have said. What is the Minister's definition of "median"?

I am sure he will come to this in different sections, but he will tell us that certain sections of this Bill benefit middle-income workers. They do not. Increasing the standard rate band does not benefit middle-income workers because a middle-income worker is on €36,000. That is the reality. Will the Minister explain the definition he is using? Is it a Fianna Fáil internal definition? Is it one they have created within the Government, or are they using the statistics available to us through the Central Statistics Office of what the average worker earns, which is an annualised figure of €699 per week, which is €36,400 per year?

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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When you take the progressivity of all these measures, the effective tax rate of someone on €25,000 has gone from 12.5% to 9.4% in five years. That is a low-income worker. Someone on €35,000 has gone from 17.1% to 14.4%. Someone on €40,000 has gone from 20.9% to 16%. Someone on €50,000 has gone from 26.4% to 20.6%. I can go on. It demonstrates the progressivity of all the tax changes we have made across a number of budgets. In budget 2025, the adjustments to personal tax credits of €125 will benefit a lot of low- and middle-income workers. The cumulative changes we have made to USC over two years from 4.5% to 3% will significantly benefit low- and middle-income workers. This demonstrates the progressivity of the overall tax system. It is also important to adjust the point at which people enter the higher rate of tax, and that is why we sought to increase the band from €42,000 to €44,000. The mean annual earnings have changed and are published by the CSO every year. The Deputy is referencing median annual earnings, but we continue to monitor wage growth within the economy. Just in excess of €50,000 is the mean annual income, recently published in August. The design of our income tax package was on reducing USC from 4% to 3% - a welcome change for many workers in our economy. There were changes to personal tax credits and the standard rate. Is it the Deputy's preference to leave the standard rate and not reward work in our economy? Is that his position? This was welcomed by many workers across our economy who have seen their wages rise and who want to be rewarded for the work they do. That is why it was important to get a blend of all three measures for workers across our economy. It is demonstrated in the progressivity of the changes I have referenced. Taking the cumulative impact of the tax package this Government has made, the effective tax rate is 9.4% for someone on €25,000 and significantly increases across higher income streams. It demonstrates the wider progressivity of the decisions we have taken from the perspective of income tax.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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I have two questions. The Minister talks about his tax package. I will answer the question he put to me. I would introduce a tax package that is fair. If I get the opportunity to sit where he is, as Minister for Finance, I will abolish the USC for average workers across the State. I will ensure that average workers never pay a tax introduced at that time by Fianna Fáil. I will ensure every worker benefits from that because the first €45,000 will be exempt from USC. That is what I will do, and I will make sure it is done within the first two years of government. That is the answer to the Minister's question and that would be fair because everybody would benefit, particularly those on low and middle incomes. He said his tax proposals are progressive, so somebody on €30,000 benefits to the tune of €59 while somebody on €75,000 benefits by €459. Is it progressive that somebody with less than half the wages of somebody else gets eight times less of a tax cut? That is not my definition of "progressive". It is interesting that he says he is using the mean. The Minister knows, because he is an intelligent person, that median means half of all workers are on one side and half are on the other side and the median income is way less than the mean.

Why is that? It is because there is a serious issue with wealth and equality in this State. The Minister creates the impression that the average worker is earning €50,000 and it is not true. He has taken the wages of all employees in the State, including those who make a lot of money, and divided by the number of employees. That is the mean. The median is a better indicator of where the population is. Half of the population of workers earn less than €36,400 and half of them earn more than €36,400 if we take all types of employment. If we take only those who are working 50 weeks or more, half of all workers earn less than €43,200 and half of all workers earn more than that. That is what middle income means. The point is that half of workers are excluded from the Government's major tax package introduced in the budget. That is fact. It introduced something that is blatantly unfair to people who are seriously struggling. That is just a fact.

Does the Minister not accept that median is the calculation that should be used to find the middle figure, where we are in terms of the population of workers? How many earn more than this number and how many earn less than this number? The median calculation is what the Minister should use. Otherwise he is just trying to create an impression. Half of the country does not earn this money. Half the country earns less than €36,000, which is what the CSO tells us according to 2023 figures. It may have increased a bit in 2024, but it is not anywhere near the Minister's €50,000 figure. If he really believes that, he does not have a sense of where people are really at.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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I agree. The public who are watching, if they are watching, see these funny arguments between Fianna Fáil and Sinn Féin, but the real thing is that the Government promised that it would abolish the universal social charge. Abolish means finito, gone, not tinkering around with the bands and raising them a bit and everything else. The Minister's party made the promise in its manifesto and made a commitment in the programme for Government that it would abolish it. How can they now have credibility when they move someone on €45,000 out of it? It is not a fair, level tax, because people on higher incomes can get more relief from it than ordinary working people. Where is the credibility?

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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We welcome that the Minister came to Killarney last weekend and took a few pictures. He was very select about where he went. I was disappointed that he did not go to meet the business people of the town-----

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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We went to the chamber of commerce.

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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-----who are very disgruntled and out of sorts because of the Government's failure to reduce the VAT rate from 13.5% to 9%. It had all kinds of money to do just that and it would rather spend it here on bicycle sheds and huts and what have you and the children's hospital where it has no control in the world over where the money is going. There is no account whatsoever of when it will be finished. There is no accountability with the finances the Government has or where it spends them.

It is unsettling and unnerving for the people who are trying to provide jobs around our county. The one request they had, and the Minister got several requests from several of us on this side of the House, was to reduce the VAT rate and it failed to do that. Many jobs will be in jeopardy and many small businesses will close down. On top of the fact that footfall has fallen and the Government has raised the commercial rates by three or four times, there are many things hitting businesses at present, such as the cost of goods, employment and all the regulations for extra holidays, sick days and everything. Employees are entitled to that, but when the Government raises the minimum wage, it is the employer who has to pay it - the Government does not pay it - and when the minimum wage goes up, all the wages have to go up. The Minister knows that but he ignores it and I cannot understand.

If we lose the employers, the Government will lose the tax they pay and the jobs they provide. It will have to pay social welfare to those people, because there is a whole raft of people who are all suffering, including those who work on Jarveys, in craft and souvenir shops, and even hairdressers. There are so many I cannot think of them all right now, but every one of them has been in contact with me and with other elected representatives. I cannot understand the methodology at all in refusing to do this. Several cases were made for it. Why in the name of God did the Government ignore these people? These are people who have been in business for many years. There has never been more of a market falling away than this year and they were trying to keep going until the end of the year to see whether the Government would give them some lift or perk. It did not. It buried them and they cannot face the time after Christmas. Some of them will probably stay on until Christmas, but a lot of them will be gone by the new year. I do not know how the Government will answer that. It will realise its mistake in a short time because it will be paying out way more social welfare.

These people were masters of what they were doing and they had the ingenuity and a way to provide jobs for people and they were doing it gladly. They were proud to be employers. They will now be wiped out because of the combination of things that have been loaded on top of them. They had one request. There is a whole lot of them; it is not only a select few. They are all around Killarney and the Ring of Kerry. They are everywhere in every nook and corner. They are suffering. I do not want to name the towns, but I was in many different towns in Kerry that were once thriving places and some of them are becoming desolate. Will the Minister reconsider at this late stage reducing the VAT rate from 13.5% to 9%?

I will mention one more issue because many people are talking about it, and that is the means test for carers. This was another chance to help people who provide a service and are justified in thinking they should get some credit for it. These people would be minding the people anyway, but it is unfair not to look after them. In every house, one person is working and the person who is doing the caring for the elderly father or mother or invalid sick sister or brother is doing it free gratis. The Government gives medical cards to people coming in from other countries. That is fine, but we should be looking after our own people who cannot get them. Likewise, we should be looking after carers. Often they are family members. Sometimes they are not; they are only neighbours and because they have other income - their partner, spouse or whatever may have another income - they are denied. Will the Minister look at that as well?

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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Does anyone else want to speak on this before we go to the Minister? No.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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Deputy McGrath asked about the previous manifesto. To be clear, we said the USC would be reduced from 4.5% to 3.5%. We reduced it from 4.5% to 3%, so we actually went further than we set out in the manifesto in 2020.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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Fianna Fáil said it would abolish it

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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No, that was Fine Gael

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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They are all the same.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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I know they are.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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That is to be factual in reply to Deputy McGrath's question.

On Deputy Doherty's question, I have set out my perspective on the three changes we have made around personal tax credits, USC and the standard rate. Even if we were to use the median, the CSO figures published today show it is €43,000 for 2023. It is likely to be higher in 2024 and higher again in 2025, so many of the workers the Deputy referred to will benefit from the change I have made in budget 2025. They will benefit from the standard rate being adjusted upwards. They will be taken out of the higher rate of income tax. That will be of benefit to those earning between €42,000 and €44,000.

In response to Deputy Healy-Rae's point, I did meet with the chamber of commerce in Killarney. I had a good engagement with it about the challenges businesses face. I also met with many others in Kerry.

In response to the question about the 9% VAT rate, as I said previously, that was not possible in the overall tax package we had available in budget 2025, but we are cognisant of the issues relating to the sustainability of costs for business. That is why the Government introduced a power up grant to support businesses, especially energy costs for retail and the hospitality sector.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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I do not want to labour the point, but while I welcome the fact that the Minister acknowledges median income in 2023 was €43,000, he should acknowledge that the CSO does that for comparable data purposes. I can read to him the email the CSO provided to me. That is only for workers who are employed for 50 weeks or more in the year. It excludes all workers who left their job during the year. It also excludes seasonal workers and it probably excludes the people who clean the schools in his constituency. It excludes a lot of care workers, including in childcare facilities.

The CSO gives us the median data for all workers in the Irish economy. That number is €699 per week. If we want to look at an annual figure, it would be about €34,000. None of them benefit from the measure the Minister just mentioned regarding the increase in the standard fund threshold. None of them are at the standard rate band, which was the major and most expensive income tax measure introduced in the budget.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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What about USC?

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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The Minister is right that they benefit from the USC. He gave them €59. Let us just settle on that.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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Amendments Nos. 2 to 4, inclusive, are related and may be discussed together by agreement. Is that agreed? Agreed.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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I move amendment No. 2:

Report on abolition and replacement of universal social charge

3. (1) The Minister shall, within three months of the passing of this Act, produce a report on abolishing the universal social charge for all those who earn less than €70,000 per year.

(2) The Minister shall, within three months of the passing of this Act, produce a report on abolishing the universal social charge for all employees in the State.

We are back to the dreaded USC, which we have spoken about already. It is a punitive, regressive tax. The Minister can correct me if I am wrong. I accept being corrected. I never object to that. There is no difference now in the spots on the leopard. They are the very same. Fine Gael is in government with Fianna Fáil, and in its manifesto it committed to abolishing the USC. It also agreed a programme for Government with Fianna Fáil. Fianna Fáil supported Fine Gael four years before that in the confidence and supply agreement. The parties have been together for nearly ten years. The parties all supported the USC at the time it was introduced. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are two sides of the same coin.

This tax is so punitive, it acts as a disincentive to people going to work. I am tired of saying this but I am a self-employed person and I have employed people. It must be rewarding for people to go to work, no matter what job it is. People must have a sense of pride in what they do. There is no point if it becomes unviable. People have a desire to get a fair day's pay for a fair day's work. They want to derive satisfaction from it and play their part in their country and nation and provide for themselves and their family. That is a noble vision and aspiration for anybody, but not when the Minister taxes them like this and then reneges on the Government's promise to abolish the USC. It is like the Taoiseach telling us since he became Taoiseach that the Government would run the full term, yet he admitted this morning for the first time that he is going to call the election this week. What kind of message does that send to the public? It is that we cannot believe aon focal or dhá focal, like in the song by Richie Kavanagh. We cannot believe any word from the Taoiseach, the Tánaiste or the Cabinet.

This tax is regressive and punitive on people on lower incomes. While the Minister has removed some of those on lower incomes, there are many other people in middle Ireland who pay for everything. They do not qualify for local authority housing or Student Universal Support Ireland, SUSI, grants. They do not qualify for medical cards, dental repairs or any kind of treatment for their children or themselves. They are trapped in a situation whereby they have to pay for everything. They can get no supports of any shape, make or form whether they go to the hospital or the doctor. They cannot get a medical card or doctor-only card. They cannot get anything.

These are the people the Government talks about and patronises. The previous Fine Gael Taoiseach - I genuinely struggle now to differentiate Fine Gael from Fianna Fáil - Deputy Varadkar, said he wanted to support the people who get up early in the morning. The Government is not supporting them in any shape, make or form. They get up an luath ar fad. They get up in the morning and go to work. I meet them. I am canvassing them. The Minister is canvassing them so he must be meeting them. They are the two types of people I meet who are so downtrodden and disappointed in the country and its future. They lack confidence in it and many of them will not vote at all because of this situation. They work all day long.

I met a lady last night and I do not believe there will be any relief for her either. She has €10,000 in a pension. She would love to unlock it. She is a young woman. She pays €1,300 a month in rent in the village of Kilsheelan near Clonmel. She has to travel to work. She and her husband are trying to get a deposit together, so that they will have some hope of putting a home together for themselves. If they were paying that amount of money in a mortgage, they would be on the road to somewhere, but that is not the case. They are so downtrodden and trapped. She and her husband both work. They have two lovely small children. It is a noble aspiration to have a family like that. They are downtrodden with tax. They must pay for everything and they get nothing. This budget did nothing at all for them.

It did nothing for that large cohort of people. I accept there were double payments for people on social welfare, pensioners and many others, which was an unashamedly naked effort to buy votes. The election is being called now when those payments are settled in and there is a feelgood factor for people. That money will go like snow off a ditch. They will sit there in Kilsheelan, right under the Comeragh Mountains. It is a cold and bleak place in the winter. We had lovely weather this week but we are going to have cold weather, heating bills, maintenance and everything else. Many people have difficult landlords.

There is another cohort of people I meet, who I am sure all present meet. I visited a private estate where the saddest thing is that in most of the houses the parents were alone and the family is imithe, gone all over the world, to Australia, Canada, New Zealand and Hong Kong. There is no sign of many of them coming back. I have 11 beautiful grandchildren, so I know what it is like to have grandchildren in all of those places. These people are saving up to go to Australia to see them. These young people are our brightest and best. The hope and dream for them was that they would grow up and be able to support them in their autumnal years, and they would be able to be around them, but they are gone. That is the case in house after house. There are tears in the eyes of some of the people.

It is so sad that Ireland today is doing this. We are not looking after our own. These are the brain pool, the enablers and the highly educated ones we need in the economy and in the country but they are going. More are going all the time. The Minister is offering them no hope in this budget. He is offering no hope whatsoever with the USC. They are being crucified with tax. They are not able to get any supports or to get on the property ladder. Is mór an trua an rud sin: na daoine óige imithe, trasna an domhan. Their parents are left at home, some ageing and ill. Some are crying. Some parents are saving up to go on the long flights to Australia, Hong Kong and other places - to a strange land they never had any desire to visit.

They feel they have to go to see their adult children and their grandchildren. That is a noble thing to be able to do as well. I am fortunate that nine of my grandchildren are within a mile of me and the other two, God bless them, are only 13 miles away. It is so sad. We are all meeting those people and we are going to meet many more of them as we go out knocking on the doors. What do we say to them?

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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I call Deputy Ó Cuív and then Deputy Danny Healy-Rae.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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Are you not going to call the movers of the motion first?

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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We can, if Deputies want to do it that way-----

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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Sorry, I meant to say amendments - the sponsors of the amendments in the grouping.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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Yes, we will do it that way. Okay. Deputies Doherty and Conway-Walsh are next then.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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I am fine.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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Deputy Boyd Barrett.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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Our amendment proposes that the Government should get rid of the universal social charge, USC, for anybody who is earning less than €100,000 and replace it with a wealth tax on the very richest in our society. Others have made promises, most notably the Fine Gael-led Government when it introduced the USC, which was a grossly unfair act by a government-----

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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We did not introduce it. The Deputy should check the record on that.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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Excuse me. It was Fianna Fáil. The Deputy is absolutely right.

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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They are all the one now.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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What Fine Gael did was say that it would get rid of the USC and then reneged-----

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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We will do it eventually.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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-----on the commitment to do so. People Before Profit has been very consistent in its view on the USC since entering this Dáil in 2011, which is that it was a grossly unfair austerity imposition on working people to pay for the crimes of the bankers and property developers who put this country over a cliff in 2008. Workers got it in the neck and were asked to pay for the crimes of others but it was supposed to be a temporary austerity measure. Workers were promised that it would go when the crisis had passed but that promise has been reneged upon. Anybody who thinks that workers out there are not still very sore about that fact is not talking to workers. Anybody who is talking to them knows that is the truth. They are very angry and bitter about the fact that every week or every month when they get their pay cheque there is a little thing in brackets, the "universal social charge", which takes a big chunk out of their wages, that was supposed to be temporary and through which they were paying for the crimes of others. Despite the promises and commitments and despite the fact that this economy has generated a record budget surplus of €24 billion, plus €13 billion in windfall tax from Apple, apparently the Government still cannot keep its promise to get rid of this temporary, emergency unfair tax on working people. It is the working people who generated that surplus. That is who generated it. Surpluses do not pop out of the sky. The surplus in the Irish economy has been generated by the hard work of working people in this country. Even now, when they are generating a record surplus, the Government will not honour its commitment to get rid of the universal social charge. The reason is that it wants to give the benefits of the surplus, the unprecedented wealth that is being generated in this country, to the super-rich, the multimillionaires, the billionaires and the corporations who are enjoying a bonanza in profits and an unprecedented growth in their personal wealth. That is the truth. The Government has robbed the poor to pay the rich and that is why it will not get rid of the universal social charge. That is not just rhetoric but is borne out by the facts.

The detail of all of this is never really discussed but it really is worth spelling out the truth of it. I heard the Minister say that what the Government has done in the budget is progressive but what is not progressive is how much workers earn and how much they pay in tax as against how much corporations earn and how much they pay in tax. The biggest tax head and the biggest source of revenue for the Government, representing 37% of all tax revenue, comes from workers. The total income of all workers in 2023 was €144 billion. They paid €24 billion in tax, which amounts to 16.6% tax on their income when all of the credits and so on are factored in. A total of 3.1 million workers earned €144 billion and paid €24 billion in tax. In contrast, corporations in the same year earned €317 billion but only paid €22 billion in tax, which represents 7.1% of their pre-tax income. Corporations have seen their income go through the roof. They earn vastly more pre-tax income than the 3.1 million workers in this country but they pay less in tax and, proportionately, they pay less than half of what workers pay on their income. That is the truth. Currently corporation tax receipts represent 27% of all tax paid. Workers pay 37% on substantially less income. That figure jumped hugely after the introduction of the USC. The proportion of revenue that was available to the Government from workers jumped. I find it laughable at budget time when finance Ministers and public expenditure Ministers say "I am allocating this to you", when what is actually happening is that they are giving workers back their own money. The money that the Government has was generated by the workers. The Government gives a little bit back to workers but it is giving most of it back in tax breaks to the big corporations that are paying, proportionately, less than half of what workers pay on a far lower amount of income.

I have mentioned the corporations but there are also the individuals who might be subject to the wealth tax that we are proposing. Again, the figures are just mind-boggling. In the fourth quarter of 2023 the Central Bank's quarterly accounts showed that the net wealth of all Irish households was €1.1 trillion. That had increased by €33.2 billion in just the last quarter of 2023. That is an incredible amount of money. It is quite shocking to think there is that much wealth in the country when workers are crushed with the cost of living but helpfully, the Central Bank explains it. Just 10% of Irish households own 54% of that wealth. It is absolutely extraordinary that 10% of Irish households own 54% of €1.1 trillion. That is increasing exponentially, year on year, while the real value of workers' incomes is getting less because of the impact of the cost-of-living crisis and the fact that they continue to be crushed with taxes like the USC. Incredibly, there are now 1,400 individuals in this country with wealth of over €47 million and 20,000 individuals with wealth of over €4.7 million.

There are 20,000 people with more than €4.5 million each in wealth and assets. That is extraordinary. Oxfam has made a simple suggestion that we have been proposing for years. I was happy to see others also proposing a wealth tax that would impose a very small tax on that wealth. It would be imposed on those with more than €4.7 million and would, therefore, affect only the 20,000 richest people in the country, who have a lot of money. The proposition is that there would be a 2% tax on the net wealth of people whose wealth is between €4.7 million and €50 million. There would be a tax of 3% on wealth between €50 million and €1 billion and a tax of 5% on wealth above €1 billion, which would apply to approximately ten individuals. Such people would probably generate 5% growth in that wealth in the course of a year. They would probably not even feel that tax but it would generate approximately €8 billion. We asked the Minister, Deputy Chambers, during the summer how much it would cost to get rid of the USC for everybody earning less than €100,000. The cost would be €2.5 billion. We could remove that brutal austerity tax and dramatically improve the financial situation of hundreds of thousands of workers in this country at the cost of €2.5 billion. We could apply a modest tax on the richest 20,000 multimillionaires in this country. They would not feel the effect of that tax and it would pay for the removal of the USC four times over. There would be money to burn if we did that and we could put that money into other things, such as housing, healthcare and so on. The Government, however, will not do it. Even now, the Commission on Taxation and Welfare and other middle-of-the-road economic think-tanks are saying we should seriously consider introducing wealth taxes. The Government still will not do it. The rich would not even feel it but the workers would feel it a lot. It would be just and fair to do it but the Government will not. It is criminal. It is robbery of the working people of this country who have generated a record budget surplus. We continue to siphon that money into the pockets of superwealthy corporations and the richest in Irish society.

I am sure the Government will not respond in any way but at least we remain consistent is saying that the USC is unfair. It has been a gross imposition on working people. The Government should honour its commitment to get rid of it and should ask the very wealthy of this country, who have done extremely well, and the big corporations to pay a small bit of extra tax to give the working people of this country a bit of justice.

Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)
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I will come back to the whole question of a wealth tax. It is an interesting question but it is a little more complex than Deputy Boyd Barrett thinks. The same applies to corporation tax.

One thing I hate in any tax proposal is the situation where if a person moves above a certain figure, he or she goes back to square one and pays from there. As a modest proposal, how much would it cost to not charge any USC on the first €13,000 of earnings? At the moment, the tax applies when one earns €14,000. People tell me that nobody hits that but pensioners, in particular, do. We must remember that social welfare income is not counted as income. If someone has a private income of €14,000 or €15,000, they are paying a little bit of USC and have to make a tax return and so on. That is particularly the case for the self-employed. Going back to the real world, how much would it cost to make that adjustment?

There is a second measure I think would be sensible. I absolutely agree with the idea of a reduction from 4% to 3%. Allowing that anybody who has a medical card does not pay more than 2%, how much would it cost if the first €60,000 was taxed at 2%, as opposed to the situation at present? I do not particularly like using the medical card as a means test for schemes other than the medical card. The Minister and I know that when the Minister for Health proposes to extend eligibility for the means test, the Department of public expenditure starts looking at all the schemes that use the medical card as a shorthand for eligibility, as it does in this case. I am not suggesting anybody should go backwards. I am suggesting that the people who are not benefiting go forwards. On the other hand, we all know that in the real world in which some of us live and where we deal with people who have very modest incomes, it is an inhibitor for people who are afraid of losing their medical cards. This Government has given out a lot of GP cards, which is welcome, but they are no substitute in most people's minds for medical cards, if we are getting down to the brass tacks of the everyday realities of the people I deal with and have dealt with for the past 35 years. These are the issues that those people are raising. Will the Minister give an indication of the cost of both of those proposals? It would be useful.

The Minister might also give us the gross figure for how much comes from the USC. When people say we should abolish taxes, I always say that is an attractive suggestion. When I was a Minister years ago, somebody suggested we abolish the VRT. I said I would prove that the VRT is a good tax. It is progressive when compared with many other taxes. We were at that time getting something in the region of €1 billion from VRT. My question was what could we replace it with. We cannot abolish taxes without replacing them with something else because otherwise we would be changing the arithmetic of the budget. As somebody who was here during the good times and the bad times before them, I remember that the people who had been telling us to spend and reduce taxes were the very ones who criticised us for being profligate when the money ran out. At that stage, we effectively had no public debt, unlike now where we have a very large public debt. We had large budget surpluses at the time, particularly when taking into account the value of money at the time compared with now. As I said, that quickly ran out with the double whammy of a reduction in taxes and an increase in costs, particularly welfare costs, hitting at the one time. It is awfully easy to move away from a surplus. If there is a gross surplus of €24 million, that is fine, but it is very easy to go from there to a deficit of twice that amount if you get that double whammy. We were hit by the reduction in taxes. People often think that capital taxation was the issue but it was not. PAYE, PRSI and VAT were the big reasons for the downturn in Exchequer funding at the time. The banks and the building crisis were obviously the cause of the downturn in the income.

The issue of taxing corporations has been well debated. It seems that no matter how well we debate the issue, people blithely go forward as if we did not live in a bigger world. Some salaries paid to people in this country for services are, on an objective level, very high. However, I recognise that if you are in international competition, you have to pay the international rate. Deputy McGrath was talking about people emigrating but some people are emigrating to America or wherever else because the salaries are better.

Many of these are in the health sector, which are paid for by the State. People go to Dubai teaching or nursing, and good luck to them. The reality is that if you want to pay salaries of that order, you have to keep coming up with the money. It is, therefore, not as simple as people make out.

Going back to the corporations, I presume an analysis has been done by the Department of Finance as to the likely migration of some of the big corporations which are the big employers. We do not seem to have a conjoined debate on this. If the Government changed its corporation tax, what is the risk of flight of some of the big multinationals that are paying a totally disproportionate amount of corporation tax? What would the consequence of that be in terms of lost PAYE, PRSI and USC, which would follow? We would once again get into the whammy of losing our industry. It might not be an ideal world because we are not living in an ideal world. These corporations have enormous choice and power.

Furthermore, it is not necessarily that they leave. I am told the risk is that the pipeline dries up. As the companies we have stop being the top companies, the new companies that replace them do not come in. If we go back to 40, 50 or 60 years ago, companies that were then world renowned became redundant because technology caught up with them. An example of this is in Rochester, New York, which I visited in 2019. It was explained to me that many thousands were employed there. One employer was Xerox. However, Xerox continued to make photocopiers and computers caught it out. The other was Kodak, the biggest photography company back when people used rolls of film and got them processed. Kodak persisted with its technology and nothing came to replace that company. The danger for us is that the pipeline of new, modern, replacement technologies would not come in here. In my lifetime I have seen lots of fine technologies disappear. Only for the fact that we had new companies coming in all the time we would have lost a great deal of our wealth had we not kept it really attractive for them to come in.

As I said, it might not be an ideal world. In a world where everybody was generous and philanthropic in a massive way, and companies did not try to make money, it would be grand. However, in the real bad world out there, I would be interested to see the analysis that has been done on the movement.

Similarly, in regard to the wealth tax, do we know of small countries similar to Ireland that have high levels of wealth tax? Have we any data on what is being raised by wealth tax and whether there was a flight of wealth by the most wealthy in those circumstances? If we are trying to hit the multibillionaires, I suspect their money would be fairly mobile and there would be a flight of finance. I would be interested in the Minister’s views on that. What analysis has been done as to why a wealth tax would have downsides that we have to think of carefully before finding ourselves in a net-zero game where we actually lose rather than gain money, by changing it, due to the mobility of wealth in the world?

As I said, I am not lauding the fact that is the case. There is far too much wealth in too few hands. I believe in the old Fianna Fáil philosophy of a dispersed ownership of wealth. For example, I am a great believer in as many people as possible getting back to the 80% owning their own house and do on. I see challenges all the time in the very open economy that we have.

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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I welcome the chance to talk about this amendment and the USC. First, I remember this USC was introduced when the country was in a desperate state. I was brought up by my father who taught me many things, thankfully. As many Members might know, I spent my days and nights with him from the day I started working until the day he departed in 2014. We milked the cows together, drove the machines together and went to meetings in the evenings together. We went everywhere together. One of the most important things he taught me was to keep my word. He said that if you have not got your word, you do not have much at all. No matter what you have in assets, if you do not have your word, you have nothing at all. Fianna Fáil at that time promised it would get rid of the USC charge when the country was out of trouble. We still have it. It is a punitive tax that affects everyone, especially now, when we hear Members saying that the country is awash with money.

I know that money does not fall from the sky. I remember a time from about 2015 to 2020 or thereabouts, when we had no money for anything, not for a road, a bridge or a sewage scheme. We had money for nothing. Everything was at a standstill. All of a sudden, Covid-19 came and there was money for all kinds of things. Then came the water scheme, there is money for everything. We see over €5 billion being spent on immigrants. We see there is no clue as to how much money is being spent on climate action. We see the ridiculous things that have been done, stopping us from cleaning our rivers, blocking drains that people slaved at to drain their land to make it more productive. We have a scenario now whereby they are narrowing the roads. We gave all our lives aspiring to widen roads to make them safer. Now, in places such as the Rock Road and up the Spa Road to Gneevgullia, they are narrowing the roads in order to slow down the traffic. They are highly dangerous now. No one travels the footpath or the cycleway on the Rock Road because they cannot get out of it nor get onto it. These are the ridiculous things-----

Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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This is-----

Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour)
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There are serious amendments to debate.

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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I am being heckled here from behind.

However, there is plenty of money for those who curtail their farm work of food production. These are the ridiculous things that are going on. Yet, at the same time, the parties are all the one now. It was a different situation in the past. They have sold their souls and buried them in the ground when they joined Fine Gael first of all, and when both parties joined the Greens they buried their souls deeper. They have forgotten any aspirations they had. Get a different name for the Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and Green Government that has been in power for the past four years. Get rid of that name. They are obliterating the name of what they stood for before. They do not stand for anything now only to ensure they get the positions of Government, whether it is Taoiseach, Tánaiste or Ministers, to divide up the spoils between whoever they are and their policies-----

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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We are supposed to be talking about the Finance Bill, Deputy.

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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What I am getting at is that they promised that as soon as the country got on its feet, they would abolish the USC charge. I am asking them to stand to their word and honour what was said by the remnants of what was there at that time.

They should honour the word they gave that this USC would be scrapped altogether. It is very unfair and unjust. No matter how much or little - especially how little - you earn, it is taken off the top and you are taxed on everything else then. There is a further charge with carbon tax and every other kind of tax. Most of you voted for it in the Chamber except our little group. You all voted for the carbon tax and you said it actually was not enough.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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No we did not, as we point out every single time.

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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What do you know? Sure you do not know whether your own son, baby is a boy or a girl.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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Fuck off.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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No, no, please now. Let us have none of that.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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Asshole.

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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You are telling us here then-----

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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You are a fucking asshole.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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Deputy, please, we are not getting into that.

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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Well, it is the truth. He told it loud. I did not make it up; he told it himself.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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Asshole.

Paul McAuliffe (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail)
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That remark should be withdrawn.

Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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You are a disgrace.

Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour)
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That should be withdrawn. There should be an apology to Deputy Murphy and his family.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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Deputy, please.

Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour)
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It should. This nonsense is tolerated far too much. It is personalised and it is insulting.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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The Deputy should withdraw the remark about Deputy Murphy's family, please. It was personal and inappropriate.

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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It is the truth but if it will please you, I will withdraw it. It is for the individual itself I am concerned.

Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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You are a disgrace. Stay quiet.

Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour)
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That is a qualified withdrawal. You are an asshole.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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To deal with the topics at hand, I think Deputy Healy-Rae was suggesting we do not know where money comes from. I will tell you where it comes from. Money is wealth generated by workers. It is not generated by millionaires like you, Deputy Healy-Rae, who come in here, railing against increasing-----

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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I am no millionaire. Withdraw that now because I can prove to everyone here I am not a millionaire.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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Okay; your brother is a millionaire. I apologise. No problem.

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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I cannot say yes or no about that because I do not know. And you do not know.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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Please, can we stop-----

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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That is not a problem.

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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Anyone working has a lot of bills to pay.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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Can people please stop making personal remarks?

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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Fine. There is a game played in here, above all, by the Healy-Raes. There are others on that side of the House who come in here and play a game of being the ordinary man and woman standing up for ordinary people who do not believe in nonsense like climate change. The Healy-Raes, in my opinion, do not stand up for ordinary people. We heard just a moment ago the Deputy railing against increases in the minimum wage. Who do they stand for? They stand for-----

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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I did no such thing. I pointed out that the Government-----

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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People can look at the record------

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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Let Deputy Murphy speak, please.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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-----and see that what is consistent is that while pretending to talk about common sense and all that good stuff, in reality, they represent the interests of the rich in this country. That is the truth of it.

It is quite ironic today to have speeches telling us it is not possible to increase corporation tax or to have a tax on wealth. The reason it is ironic today is that I got a push notification from The Irish Times to say that the first €3 billion tranche of Apple tax money has landed in State coffers. I remember being told something was impossible. Those of us who opposed the Apple tax deal, called it out and opposed the waste of public money on fighting a case to keep the money on the balance sheet of one of the richest corporations in the world were told, sure the money would never be yours anyway, all the other countries would try to take it and it would never end up being in the hands of the Irish State. What has happened? We are utterly vindicated. The first €3 billion has come and the rest will come. Do not believe it when people say alternative policies are not possible or workable; that is designed to constrain the terms of debate to say to people in the old Thatcher terms that there is no alternative. It is not true. There is an alternative to the USC; that is what our amendment is about. One alternative is a millionaire's tax on the wealth of the super-rich.

Research by Oxfam founds that the richest 1% own more than one third of Irish financial wealth. There are 11 billionaires in this country. Men like Eugene Murtagh, the founder of Kingspan whose company was found partly responsible for the Grenfell Tower disaster; Denis O'Brien, who bribed a Fine Gael Minister to secure the second mobile phone licence; and Dermot Desmond, who made payments to Charlie Haughey. All of them amassed their riches not off their own work but off the backs of workers and from corruption. All now have more money than they could ever spend. There is also more than 1,400 people in this country who have wealth of over €47 million; more than 20,000 have wealth of more than €4.7 million. Just by taxing this tiny elite, less than 1% of the population, Oxfam has shown how €8 billion could be raised every year. That is €3 billion more than the total amount raised from the USC last year. We could abolish the USC and still have €3 billion left over every year to fund public housing, free public childcare or a proper national health service. Every year, the Finance Bill is passed and Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Greens make a political choice not to tax the super-rich, who can well afford it. They choose instead to impose the burden of taxation on ordinary workers, who cannot.

In the midst of a dire cost-of-living crisis, where so many families struggle literally to keep the lights and heat on and to put food on the table, we should not make millionaires and billionaires exempt from paying. We should make them pay, not take the money out of workers' pockets. There should be no billionaires. People do not have the right to have billions of euro of wealth. They do not deserve it. I do not believe they have earned the multiples they have compared to the average worker and the average amount of wealth. It should be taken from them and redistributed to those who need it. They are the only species on this planet who deserve to become extinct.

Aindrias Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
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I will focus on a group of people who work day after day and at the end of the week and month still find it hard, despite that modest, reasonably decent pay cheque, and struggle to make ends meet. They are not looking for benefits. Often, they are not eligible for them. They are keen to hold on to a reasonable portion, and more, of their hard-earned pay. Economists might know them as the middle four deciles; whatever level we put on them, they are people with modest incomes who work and are keen to spend on their families and to hold onto their income. The USC is a big deal for many. The 1% change to 3% is helpful to these people. It is meaningful income at the end of the week and month. We would love for it to be more. I want to get a handle on how practical that is and what it would cost to give further space and would it not be wonderful to do away with it? What would be the euro value of doing away with the USC and how practical is it? It sounds popular but can we put euro values on it to define it?

Tá brú mór ar an dream seo, daoine atá ag obair go laethúil, agus arís gach seachtain, ag deireadh na seachtaine nó na míosa, go bhfuil sé deacair orthu na billí a íoc in ainneoin go bhfuil tuarastal réasúnta acu. Tar éis seachtaine nó lá fada a chur díobh, tá an cháin tar éis an tuarastal sin a chreimeadh agus tá brú orthu. Mar sin, tá an USC an-tábhachtach dóibh. Is cabhair mhór í go bhfuil an 1% á bhaint anuas. Ba mhaith liom go bhféadfaimis dul níos sia leis sin agus teastaíonn uaim a fháil amach ón Aire cé chomh praiticiúil agus cén costas a bheadh ann chun breis USC a bhaint anuas ón dream sin sa lár, daoine atá ar phá réasúnta agus go bhfuil deacracht acu gach seachtain a mbillí a íoc.

This section also relates to income taxes and a reduction in the income taxes is definitely something that would benefit the very same group of people, as would the changing of the bands and the relief on it. If they are not changed each year, it means people are falling behind. They may be fortunate enough to get a pay rise. What examination has been conducted into index linking the reliefs and the bands for people on modest incomes so that they can hold on to an additional part of their pay packet each week and month?

There is one other area I would like to inquire about, which is inheritance tax. I am not entirely sure if that is appropriate to this section but inheritance tax and the changes that were made, particularly to the group A, helped a particular group of people. I want to draw the attention of the Minister to couples who do not and are not fortunate enough, or choose not, to have children of their own. Their families want to pass on to those families part of what they have hard earned and paid tax on along the way. People inheriting in this case would not be able to avail of the group A tax band similar to the way in which a son or daughter can. What examination has been conducted in respect of those families and the opportunities that might be there for them also with regard to inheritance tax?

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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We can spend hours talking about this. USC, as I said at the outset, is a disingenuous, heinous and cruel tax that was brought in as a temporary arrangement after the crash. The coalition Government promised to abolish it. The Minister might shake his head and say that Fianna Fáil did not but they are one and the same now - totally hybrid. The Green Party members are hanging around there as well and they do not know what they are doing but Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are all the one and are more and more alike. How will they be able to go out, knock on doors and ask people to vote for them, where Fianna Fáil attack Fine Gael and Fine Gael attacks Fianna Fáil? The old traditional way is imithe, gone. I know that the parties have enough spin doctors to do this for them but the real issue is this punitive charge on ordinary working people. It is punitive and regressive.

I certainly will not take any lectures from An Teachta Ó Murchú about us standing up for ordinary people. We put our names before the electorate, the Healy-Raes and myself, and it is up to the electorate to decide, as it is in the case of Deputy Murphy. I know from social media that the Deputy is pleading with people to come out and help them as he is afraid he will be swamped up or removed and I do not know what panic he is in. If he is doing his work and is looking after the people, that should not bother him.

I actually agree with Deputy Murphy 100% as regards the rich and the super rich in that they should be taxed heavily. They are entrepreneurs and provide much good work and all but this has to stop somewhere. The gravy train has to stop but the problem is that Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil are beholden to these people, including the beef moguls and the big business people. We have seen that time out of hand.

They are grouped in with Deputy Murphy's support as are all of the NGOs. They are now like a field of daisies, there are so many of them in the field. If they can be where the cow has done her business, there would be dozens of them. There are 36,000 non-governmental organisations costing €6 billion a year. I question the validity of tens of thousands of them. There are some very good people there and certainly necessary NGOs but this has gone beyond. They are in front of, behind, beside, before and around the Government and they are just dictating its policy. It does not matter what legislation or the amendments the Members in this House try to bring in; they are there and they have such a grip around the handlebars of power because they have been allowed to do so by weak Ministers. That is very sad.

I have no more to say on this amendment. We know that we will be putting this to a vote and we know that it will be voted down by people who are speaking here in support of it this, which is the comical part of it.

Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
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I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate. Listening to Deputy Mattie McGrath most recently and earlier this evening, he failed to acknowledge that this is a much more fragmented Dáil. There are many political parties and each political party will contest the election on its own platform. This outgoing Government is a government of three very distinct and unique individual parties that fought the last election on their own election manifesto and will fight this election on their own election manifesto. As the Minister, Deputy Chambers, quite rightly said, what the Government achieved in the reduction of the USC went over and above what the party had gone to the country with on the last occasion. I compliment the Minister for achieving that in the negotiations for this budget. If we are to take on board that we are all the same, as Deputy Mattie McGrath concluded, then all the Independent Deputies must be the same. He must be the same as the People Before Profit Deputies or whatever other Independents, including the Independent Alliance and Independent Ireland. They are all the same by Deputy McGrath's calculation but they are not.

He wants to have his cake and to eat it, as he is a Deputy who likes to use old sayings in Dáil debates. I compliment the Minister for Finance on achieving the reduction in the universal social charge. We would certainly like to see us going further. Where I agree with Deputy McGrath is that as a Government, we have to continually strive to ensure that we incentivise and reward work. It is most important that the people who get up and go to work feel that they are getting a break and that they are supported and rewarded for what they do. We are very fortunate in this country today that we have full employment and that anybody who wants a job here does not have to go abroad to get work. They have the opportunity to work in this country and indeed many people are coming from abroad to work here because it is an attractive place to work. I, for one, will always speak up for and talk up the benefits of the country rather than talk down how good this country is doing like some of our colleagues. The fact that the Minister was able to secure a budget surplus means that we have the necessary resources now to tackle the issues out there. There are challenges but there are always challenges in society. How a government responds to those challenges is critically important.

Listening to some Opposition Members, one might somehow believe that the cost-of-living measures introduced were somewhat wrong. If people take a very short look at some of their social media pages, they will see that they are all welcoming and advertising when the cost-of-living measures will be introduced and paid to the recipients. On the one hand, they are criticising us in here for what we are doing and, on the other, they are going on social media and advising people when these measures that this Government has introduced will become available to them.

I will make one other point that I would like the Minister to clarify. I am not sure it is exactly relevant to this section but based on the fact that we may not get to the relevant section, I welcome the extension to the help-to-buy scheme. Going back to what previous speakers said, this is about rewarding people who work and giving those people the opportunity to claim their tax back so that they can buy their first home. This is about supporting people into home ownership. This is, again, another aspiration of our party. I welcome the fact that there is certainty in this regard out to 2029. On the help-to-buy scheme, I refer to the rigidity, sometimes, of how schemes are implemented by Revenue and on the loan-to-value criteria. Sometimes the initial loan to value that is submitted can be different from when the actual house is completed. Revenue still will not take on board an updated loan to value.

Let us say somebody is starting out building a house and they have a desire to build it to a certain specification with a Rolls Royce finish. The garden, the landscaping, the garage and everything is done but for whatever reason they do not get to finish it off because they do not have the money to do so. Then the value of the property is less than what the projected value of it is and when they look to achieve their drawdown of the loan-to-value, they are told the loan-to-value now does not meet the criteria. That is wrong because the valuation on a completed property is much more realistic than a projected valuation on the property when the application is made on day one. The property may not have been finished to the standard people wanted. They may not have put in hardwood doors internally or may have opted for an IKEA kitchen over a handmade one because that is all they could afford. Then when they go back to avail of the help-to-buy scheme they are told the original valuation submitted must be stuck with. That needs to change. I raised it with the Minister's office with reference to two specific cases in my constituency and did so as well as with the Minister's predecessor. Both times there was an undertaking to review this or to explore if something could be done and I would certainly welcome something being done in this regard. I compliment Deputy Chambers on what he achieved in his short term as Minister for Finance.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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I welcome the changes to the USC and the tax bands. Contrary to the opinion that the higher rate of tax kicks in too late for some, we have to recognise, as Deputy Ó Cuív mentioned, that we are in a constant competition for talent and if our taxes on jobs are too high, we will lose jobs. I have listened to debates here inside out and upside since 2011 on the tax policy of the three governments since then. The recognition the approach has been right is shown in today's employment statistics, which show the guts of 800,000 jobs have been added since that year. This shows the last three governments have got tax policy on job creation and protecting jobs correct. It means in many sectors we use little carrots and sticks to encourage those with wealth to spend it here and invest it here, be it in research and development or other areas, to invest it in their business and put it back into their business. That is all with a view to job creation, not a view to making them richer, which is the picture painted here by an awful lot of people. They think that is what we are about; it is not. We are about generating an economy that can then be used to fuel the investment we need in housing, education, health and everywhere else it is called for day after day in this House.

We sat here and had many discussions in 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016 when we only had less than €1 billion to spend on housing and an ask to spend more. Now we are spending €6 or €7 billion of taxpayers' money on housing, along with other money. Nobody in opposition ever asks what happened to bring us from €1 billion to €6 billion. It is because the country has been run right with the right policies to bring in the right amount of tax. None of us likes paying tax, be it income tax, USC or any of it. Deputy Boyd Barrett is right. I would have loved to have been able to get rid of the USC, but it is not realistic. It is realistic to try to cut in at it as the Minister has done again this year by taking another percentage point off it and in general get us back down there at the same time as protecting our public finances and ensuring we are investing them properly, which is what we are trying to do here. The key to that is job creation. Debate after debate here gives the impression it is all about trying to make those who create the jobs wealthier, but it is not about that. Many of those people take extra risk and it is when they have their business at a certain size and have created a certain amount of employment that we are trying to ask them to go further, take on more risk and expand into international markets. I see policies from other parties in opposition that also encourage the same thing. They are speaking out of two sides of their mouths because if they are asking those businesses to take that risk, there has to also be some reward.

Most importantly, we have to ensure their employees are always encouraged to take on the extra work. We need the person to come in and do an extra shift at the weekend to maybe generate more ideas and to think in a quiet time of a new concept or something else in research in development. If we tax them too high, why would anybody with that expertise come in to do the extra couple of hours or the extra shift? Why would they if the government is going to put its hand in, take out 55% or 56% and put it in its pocket? The money would be well spent, but an individual will not be encouraged to put their brain to work for that extra time if too much of their money is taken away. That is why it is important the Minister is bringing the point where the higher rate of tax kicks in up. We must remember we are constantly competing for talent. There are many different incentives here. There are a lot of changes we will not even get to that are supporting SMEs, investment in SMEs, putting funds back in and rewarding that, as well as startups. It is about the right environment and we are making the changes bit by bit. I will always say that from an enterprise point of view we do not make them quick enough, but we are on the right path. Every year I see progressive changes here to the system that will create jobs. That is so important because too many people in here forget where we back in 2011 when we were scrambling to find jobs and there was misery out there. That has completely changed.

It is quoted that people are leaving the country and this, that and the other. Whenever you look at those articles and see the headline it always tells you how many thousand left the country and it is only when you go down into the article you will see how many came home. Generally, in the last couple of years, I am thankful it has been an equal number coming home. There are more coming in in total, but those coming home nearly always equal those who are leaving. Our job as legislators and as the people in charge of the public finances is to ensure people have the option to stay here and people have the option to come home. People did not have those options many times in the country’s history, but fortunately they have them now. Our job is to ensure that job is still there in three, five, 15 and 20 years. That is why all the decisions the Minister has led on in this budget, which were across the three parties, are about making sure those options and choices will still be there in five, 15 and 20 years. It is about putting resources in now to protect the public finances in future and by investing in infrastructure now for the long term.

Of course, there are always going to be challenging times when it comes to housing. I have no doubt about that. There is no doubt we missed a couple of years where unfortunately we were unable to invest in housing, but fortunately we are on the right track now and people have the choice to come back home. There are numerous schemes there to avail of, but we have to stick at it and continue with it. When we have policies that work like the help-to-buy scheme, the home equity scheme and the various schemes we know are now working, that other parties are even considering changing them in a general election is a really unstable way to go with the country. After all the years of trying to make these changes, we are getting it right. How do we know we are getting it right? We see the activity in housing coming up to the level we want to get to. Again, I hear people quoting mad figures of going to 80,000 or 90,000 homes per year. That will bring us back to where we were before. It has to be a steady, progressive increase in supply every year to a level that is sustainable, and that needs to keep going for 20 or 30 years. That is really important. It is about the numbers at work and then a progressive tax system. Please do not tell me we do not have a progressive tax system. Every one of us can pick out a category of people and say one got €50 and another €150. It is the percentages you look at to see progressivity, as the Minister will say. To see a progressive tax policy it is the percentages you look at, not an individual sample of someone who got €20 and someone who got €50. It is the percentages and they are right. They were always progressive in the last number of budgets we have been responsible for.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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I am the sponsor of amendment No. 3, which seeks a report on abolishing USC on the first €45,000 of the income of all workers. I made the point earlier on we are going into a general election and if I have the honour of going into government, that is exactly what I would do within the first two years as Minister for Finance. There would be no USC paid by average workers in this State ever again and all workers would benefit from the first €45,000 of their income being exempt from USC.

I will make a few points. Deputy McGrath and others have made the point Fine Gael promised to abolish the USC. It had nice posters, placards and photo opportunities about that, but it was not just Fine Gael. Fianna Fáil promised to abolish USC on the first €80,000 of income and Labour promised to abolish it on the first €72,000 of income in the run-up to the last general election. Fianna Fáil has held the finance Ministry for a number of years.

People think the Minister has done a great job by reducing it by one percentage point, giving that €59 to the person who earns €30,000. However, it is a far cry from what the former Minister, Deputy Michael McGrath, campaigned for in 2016. I just wanted to put on the record that it was not just Fine Gael that made pledges in respect of USC.

I am conscious that we are in the mouth of an election. I have listened to what other speakers have said. I agree with a lot of what Deputy Ó Cuív has said. He came close to endorsing some of Sinn Féin's policies because our proposal to abolish USC on the first €45,000 would benefit everybody. There would be no step effect. Medical cards would also be made available to those individuals under our proposals, which was the second issue the Deputy talked about when discussing that step effect.

On the picture the Fine Gael Deputy has presented in the House today, there is no doubt but that the economy is doing well and that we have resources in abundance, particularly because of the Apple tax. I agree with Deputy Paul Murphy. We put down motion after motion on the Apple tax and the then Minister for Finance, Deputy Donohoe, blatantly told us that, even if we got the money, we would not be able to keep it. Did he just make that up? Did he deliberately mislead the Dáil? Did he believe it at the time? Was he just embarrassed that the Commission had called him out on selective tax arrangements? It was not true. We see that is the case because nobody is even whispering it today. I agree with what Deputy Paul Murphy has said in that regard.

Listening to the previous speaker, you would not think that more than 500,000 people are in poverty in this State. You would not believe that 170,000 children are in poverty in this State. You would not think that we had the highest levels of homelessness, including child homelessness, ever seen in this State. That is after 14 years of Fine Gael government. The Fine Gael TD rightly pointed out that, with regard to immigration, that people have to be given an option. I agree with him on that. That is exactly what I believe this election is going to be about. It is going to be about hope. However, we also need to cut through the bull and look at the facts. Home ownership for the under-40s has collapsed since Fine Gael went into government.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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No, it has not. That is not factually true.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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That is fact. There are-----

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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That is not true. Check your percentages. Go back to your percentages.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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Let me deal with this. Some 100,000 fewer under-40s own their own home today compared with when Fine Gael entered government.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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Go with your percentages.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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That is a fact. Home ownership has collapsed for the under-40s. That is fact. It has fallen by half. When Deputy English talks about wanting to give people a country that gives people the opportunity to come home again, I agree 100%. However, they did not leave because they could not get a job. That is not the reason they are leaving in such numbers. They are leaving because Fine Gael has pushed home ownership out of reach for those individuals. People who, before Fine Gael came into government-----

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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Sinn Féin wants to cancel the schemes. It wants to cancel the two most important schemes.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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Fine Gael do not want to hear the truth. That is okay but the Deputy should have a little bit of múineadh, a little bit of manners.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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Explain your two schemes.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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Home ownership has collapsed under Fine Gael. As I have said, 100,000 fewer under-40s own their own home today as did before Fine Gael entered government. The average age at which a person first owns their own home in this State today is 39. All of these kids, these adults, know that their lives are on pause not because they cannot get a job or because the economy is not booming, but because home ownership and family formation is paused for many of them. I have an 18-year-old and a 17-year-old at home. It is now normal for people to be thinking of heading to Australia when they are that age. That should never be normal but that is what has happened. The Deputy talks about schemes. The reality is that, since Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael entered government, house prices in this city of Dublin have gone up by €100,000. The Government will do something for people in one area but push house prices up by €100,000 on the other end. Before Deputy English came in, I made the point that institutional funds have bought 6,200 apartments in this State in the last year. That is four times more than what they were buying before this Government came into office.

Paul McAuliffe (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail)
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The Deputy is not speaking to the section.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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With respect, I will not take any lectures from Deputy McAuliffe either. He does not like to hear what the Government parties have done to the young generation of this State. Deputy English talked about giving people hope and an opportunity. I have responded to those comments. I am calling out the bull in the suggestion that people are leaving because of the economy. It is because of housing. The Minister talked about figures, data and new measures. What party goes into a general election planning to fail on housing again? The Cabinet sat around a table today and decided to challenge itself to deliver 20% fewer houses than the figure identified by the expert commission on housing. You could not make this up. Those are the facts. That is the reality.

The Minister talked about reducing taxes on workers. That is what this section is about. It is what my amendment is about. It is about making sure that no worker in this State pays USC on the first €45,000 of income. That is affordable and deliverable. It is not what Fine Gael said when it paraded around with its posters and when Deputy Varadkar led the troops saying that Fine Gael would abolish the USC. It is not that. It is not what Fianna Fáil said, which was that it would abolish it for those earning less than €80,000. It is what is appropriate. It deals with all middle-income earners in this State but benefits everybody. I will move the amendment and I will push it to a vote because it is what is required as regards USC over the coming years.

Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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A lot of nonsense has been spoken about housing here today, particularly by some of the Government representatives. When canvassing in the Dublin area, it is an entirely different story. House after house, I meet people who tell me about their two sons in their late 20s or 30s who are still living with them and who have no hope of getting a place to live. They tell me about their daughter and her family, her partner and children, who are staying with them while trying to save because they cannot possibly save money while paying rent. Door after door, that is the story.

Looking at the facts of what has been happening in housing, we see that there have been virtually no houses built in the Dublin city area during the term of this Government. No affordable housing scheme houses at all have been built in the Dublin city area in the lifetime of this Government. What is being built in high-rise apartments. That is what is covering my constituency as regards new developments. The same applies right across the Dublin city area. Even if people want to settle down, have a family and so on, these apartments are, in the main, highly unsuitable. Even if people want to buy, they cannot because more than 90% of those apartments have been bought by vulture funds. They are mainly build-to-rent, lower standard, smaller shoeboxes with no storage and no usable outdoor space. When this Government talks about all the units it is building, it is essentially talking about high-rise apartments. When people in their late 20s and 30s want to buy a home, settle down and start families of their own, they are not looking for built-to-rent apartments; they are looking for a home.

Because no new homes are being built, there is very great pressure on the second-hand market. Most houses that become available on the second-hand market in Dublin city now go for approximately €100,000 more than the asking price. That is completely and utterly out of reach for most households, even where you have two people in very good jobs. Most people in public sector jobs, such as nurses, teachers, gardaí, cannot afford to buy a house in Dublin. That is the reason people are emigrating. Some people do not seem to understand that. We are also in serious trouble in trying to recruit essential public service staff.

They cannot afford to live in Dublin because there are no affordable houses in Dublin city and very few in County Dublin. That is the legacy left by this Government and there is no denying it. While there are new units everywhere, they are all high rise, build to rent and bought up by vulture funds. That is the reality of housing thanks to this Government. That is the reality of the kind of housing provided in the Dublin city area in the past four and a half years or longer.

People sometimes ask why the Social Governments did not enter government after the 2020 election or indeed the 2016 election. On both occasions, we had negotiations with Fine Gael on the possibility of entering government and, on both occasions, those negotiations broke down irreparably because Fine Gael continued to pursue failed housing policies. The proof of that is all around us ten years later. That is why people are emigrating. It is why young people feel they have been utterly let down by this Government and there is no hope for them in getting a decent start in their own country. These are people who did everything right. They got good leaving certificate results, went to college, got good jobs and still cannot set up a life for themselves in Dublin city. The implications of this for their parents are enormous in terms of pressures and overcrowding in the home and all of that. That is what we are finding. The Minister cannot be finding anything different on the doorsteps when he is canvassing in Dublin West because that is the story across Dublin. It is the appalling legacy the Government has left to young people in this country. It has failed them and they feel they have no hope in this country. They cannot foresee a future for themselves or have the same kinds of dreams and aspirations their parents had because the Government has prevented them from doing that. One of the key priorities and responsibilities of Government is to ensure an adequate supply of affordable housing for its citizens. The Government has utterly failed to do that.

The other issue relates to tax. There has been a lot of debate today about the taxation system. When one looks at the budgetary policies pursued, they are the same as last year. It is giveaway stuff to try to buy people's votes. People are not fooled by that, however. They have said in successive opinion polls that they want investment in services rather than money being frittered away and, certainly, rather than receiving tax cuts. What we have seen in this budget and the previous one is that people receive once-off payments. In the main, it is people on lower incomes and on welfare who receive the once-off payments. It is people on higher incomes who get the very generous tax cuts, which, of course, are permanent benefits as opposed to the benefits for people on lower incomes. This is what happening. While it is grand for people to get an extra few bob coming up to Christmas, and no one would turn that down, what happens after Christmas when the one-off payments are all gone and prices are still going up? That is why we in the Social Democrats have argued at every single budget that we should be spending any surplus or spare money on improving services rather than on regressive tax cuts. Unfortunately, this Government has taken a different approach.

While we have a significant problem with low incomes in this country, people, whether they are on low or middle incomes, cannot afford to access childcare or timely healthcare. This is all in addition to not being able to afford to pay a mortgage or rent. They cannot afford the kinds of transport costs associated with living in a city either. This all adds up and makes living difficult for people.

It is all very well for the Government to talk about implementing health reform but the reality is that, in many cases, even if someone qualifies for a medical card or a doctor visit card, it is still exceptionally difficult to see a doctor. That is due to the kinds of policies that have been pursued and the failure of the Government to introduce salaried GP posts, the implementation of which is overdue.

In that regard, I will talk about a project in Dublin city, namely, GP Care for All. The Minister is aware of it because I have raised it with him several times, as have others. Unfortunately, he has just brought down the shutters on it. He has not listened, which I am really surprised about, especially given that he is a GP and knows the difficulties with accessing GP care. I am sure he is familiar with the fact that, as the statistics from GP Care for All point out, in certain parts of Dublin it has been found that the medium age of death was 59 years versus a national figure in the early 80s. This is because people cannot access healthcare and the market-driven model pursued by this Government and previous Governments does not service areas of disadvantage particularly well. It is a reality, a rule in medicine, that the greater the need for healthcare in a particular area, the less likely it is that the area will get that healthcare. That is what happens with market-driven policies.

GP Care for All, which is a charity, recognised this issue of the absence of adequate healthcare availability in areas of severe disadvantage. In this regard, it set up a charitable practice in Summerhill in 2016. As the Minister should know, this is an area of high disadvantage. It set up that practice and has been successfully providing primary care services to the most disadvantaged people in this country. The charity was in touch with me and some of the other representatives in Dublin North-West about providing the same service in the Finglas west area, which is another area ignored and neglected by the market-driven approach of this Government. There has been no GP operating in the entire Finglas west and south area for approximately 20 years. The Minister should know the implications of that for the health status and life expectancy of the people living in the area. GP Care for All was ready to set up a practice similar to the one in Summerhill in the Finglas west area. We were all very supportive of the proposal, which would have made an enormous difference to the health status and quality of life of the residents living there. We then learned - just a matter of months ago - that effectively the plug had been pulled on this important promised development. It was pulled because there was a change to the taxation system. Until January, the HSE was happy to regard contract income by GPs as a group income for a charity like GP Care for All. That is how it operated in Summerhill. There was a change made, however, in the taxation of income in partnerships, which has effectively excluded GP Care for All. It means the proposal for Finglas will not go ahead and the Summerhill service is now jeopardised. The likelihood is it will have to wind up by the end of the year. The Minister, by a stroke of a pen, could have tackled this issue to ensure the service in Summerhill continued and that the people of Finglas west and south received the kind of healthcare service they need and deserve. I am appealing to the Minister again. He has been appealed to by various Members, some ministerial colleagues and even the Ceann Comhairle who is very supportive of this charity. Despite this, he has failed to act.

Dr. Austin O'Carroll, whom the Minister will know and who does extraordinary work, and his colleagues have been meeting in the Department of Health. That Department is very happy to see this kind of model supported; the difficulty is in Revenue and the Department of Finance.

This is probably one of the last times I will speak in the Dáil. We have been working towards getting proper healthcare for people in Finglas west and south for a very long time. I am making a very strong appeal to the Minister, as I am sure other representatives for that area will do, to take on this issue and to introduce the very minor change that is required in order for this charity to continue its really important work. I ask the Minister to give consideration to that appeal and to make that move. It is a very small change he could make that would make an enormous difference to the lives and the health of so many people in this country. I ask him to revisit this issue as a matter of urgency.

Joe Flaherty (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
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We are speaking a lot about taxation. I want to address the issue of capital gains tax retirement relief changes to be made under section 55 of the Finance Bill 2024. I welcome aspects of the changes, in particular the €10 million limit, which will not now come into effect until 1 January 2025. I would suggest, however, that a small number of changes could be made that would significantly improve the operation of this scheme. I ask that the Minister give consideration to the deferral. It should be rolled over where there is a subsequent onward gift that would also qualify for deferral under this subsection. This transfer from the child to the grandchild should not trigger a tax liability. Second, the amount assessed and charged under subsection (4A)(d) should be limited to an amount calculated to the actual proceeds received on disposal. The example could be if the transferred assets were to be severely diminished or liquidated as part of an administration or forward sale. Third, and finally, the necessity to claim the full abatement after 12 years in a tax return is overly burdensome, does not necessarily serve a policy purpose and should be deleted.

As I said, I welcome the changes as regards the €10 million; however, I have concerns that the clawback period of 12 years appears very long. Such a holding period would, I fear, impede the orderly development of the business. Also, it is significantly longer than the period in play for our neighbours in the UK, and there is a concern that it might force some family businesses to look at moving their ownership base from here to overseas. The kernel of the ask is that the Minister look at that and, ideally, move from a 12-year period to a six-year period.

Paul McAuliffe (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail)
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I join my constituency colleague, Deputy Shortall, in speaking about the USC obligation on general practitioners involved in the GP Care for All practice. I note as a broader point the changes to the USC and welcome them. I think they will be very welcome for workers. I will return to them in a moment but I want to speak to the point Deputy Shortall raised. Since she said it might be her last time speaking in the House, I also acknowledge her almost 32 years served in Dáil Éireann. I think I am correct in saying she is the longest serving female TD in the House. I do not know whether or not that makes her the mother of Dáil Éireann but I do know that Róisín would not welcome our giving her too much faint praise, so I will not do that.

The benefit of having somebody serving so long in a constituency is that you remember all the promises that have been made by different agencies. The requirement for GPs in our area is incredibly important, particularly in the Finglas west and south area. We have a promise of a primary care centre, and that will have GPs located in it, but it is still a number of years off. We have a solution here for a practice but the tax elements of it are causing difficulty in it being implemented. The proposed solution may be put on the Minister's desk, but the reality is that this sits with the Department of Health and the legislation which limits the ability of the HSE to contract with anybody other than an individual with regard to the GP contract. That can be for a good reason, because we do not necessarily want for-profit conglomerate groups coming in, but we have to look at that legislation, the Department of Health has to look at that legislation, and the Department of Health and the HSE have to look at changing that to allow for not-for-profit operators.

As I said, this is broader than the proposed tax changes, but there is a bizarre situation where we have an employee of a not-for-profit practice in this case who has a shared tax arrangement with their partner, and their partner with them receives the USC liability for that entire practice. I know that contractually that income is assigned to that person. In practice, however, that income does not arrive in that person's bank account; it is retained by the not-for-profit practice. I draw the Minister's attention to this again. He knows we have spoken about this, and I know he and the Minister, Deputy Donnelly, have spoken about it. I welcome news from GP Care for All that there have been some discussions on this and that there is a proposal for a way forward with regard to Summerhill. I suppose there is a caution there on the part of GP Care for All in that if this issue is not resolved for the Summerhill practice, it is unwilling to extend its current sphere of influence into the Finglas area. The thing I care about is providing more GP care services into the Finglas area.

Within whatever remit is left, or whatever possibilities are left between the Department of Health and the Department of Finance, we have to come to a solution on this. The reality is that the HSE providing directly employed GPs within a primary care centre is the solution. I will not drift too much off this, but the USC obligation for somebody working in a not-for-profit practice does not make sense logistically, even though technically the contractor arrangements are there. I ask the Minister to look at that issue.

More broadly, on the changes in the budget, with regard to USC, in many ways the budget is about keeping ahead of or keeping track with inflation while not adding to inflationary impacts. Between the Finance Bill and the Social Welfare Bill, we have done that in terms of USC changes, changes to tax plans, changes to things like the renter's tax credit, even some of the changes around the home carer's tax credits and so on, so some of what this Bill does is keep everybody where they are. That is often what a budget does. A huge chunk of a budget is about keeping people where they are. Equally, however, we have to address inequalities and reforms. Particularly with regard to the home carer's tax credit, to which this section relates, in the next Dáil we have to look at the two areas of people with a disability who are working, or people with a disability who have a social welfare payment, and, equally, carers who are working or who have a partner working or those exclusively on a social welfare payment. We know that within those two areas, disability and caring, there is a broad level of needs. Also, it is a very broad spectrum in terms of income earning. I know from the many carers who come to my clinic, particularly women, which is many of them, whose partner might work, that they find it a huge injustice that their income is adjusted by means tests from social welfare. They regard it as income but, of course, it is a social welfare support. In the next Dáil, we can and should be more ambitious in that area. However, I welcome the changes to the home carer's tax credit in this section.

Rose Conway-Walsh (Mayo, Sinn Fein)
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I know you are about to conclude this, a Leas-Cheann Comhairle, but I was struck by Deputy McAuliffe's comment that the Bill keeps people where they are because that is exactly what is coming back from this budget - the sense of injustice. People know that, come next February and March, they will be in the very same position as they were before this. It certainly keeps them in their place, whether that be carers or young people looking for a house.

I listened with interest to all the talk about the need for people to have jobs. We talked earlier about choices. The choice that people from County Mayo, particularly north Mayo and the Erris region, where I am from, have faced on finishing college has been between living with their parents or going abroad for a place to live. The latter is what so many have done. You have only to look at the football teams in rural Ireland to see how many young people have been forced to go. The young people are our brightest and best. They are desperately needed in the likes of Mayo University Hospital, where they would find employment if that hospital were to implement safe staffing levels. The hospital has more than 80 positions vacant. We do not have the speech and language therapists or occupational therapists required, nor do we have staff across so many other disciplines. Young, educated people are forced to leave the country because they simply do not have a place to live. It is certainly a matter of keeping people where they are.

I am struck by the lack of awareness of what meeting the cost of living is like for people. If they get an extra payment, it is gone within minutes on paying arrears on energy bills, making mortgage repayments and paying high rent. Twice as much is taken out of one pocket as is put into another.

The sensible way to deal with taxation is, as Deputy Doherty said, to abolish the USC for people earning under €45,000 per year. That would have been the fair way to proceed. People would have more money in their pockets.

I heard the Deputy who said what their party would do in the next Government. I would not presume the Irish people will put back into government the same people who put them into their current position and told them they will remain in it. The implication is that the current Government has had only 13 years and needs another five, or a total of 18 years. It is absolutely ludicrous that the Government would deny, even at this late stage, what it has failed to do in the budget. It has no excuses this time; the excuses have run out.

We talked earlier about the Apple tax, which the Government spent €10 million trying not to get back. Its members are now falling over themselves promising what they will do with the tax, which was rightfully the Irish people’s tax in the first place. People can see through what is being done here. They can see through the short-termism of the budget and the absolute lack of vision regarding what we are considering this evening. The nation will not be bought by short-term gimmicks. I really would call them gimmicks. IFAC referred last year to the gimmickry going on in the economic sphere. There are certainly gimmicks in the budget but the Irish people will not be fooled by them.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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I acknowledge everyone who has spoken. There was a wide array of topics referred to and I will try to respond on some of them. On amendments numbers 2, 3 and 4, on the universal social charge, the Rural Independent Group has requested a report on the abolition of the charge for those earning less than €70,000 per annum and a report on abolishing the charge for all employees in the State. Deputy Boyd Barrett has requested a report on abolishing the USC and replacing it with a wealth tax. Deputies Doherty and Conway-Walsh have requested a report on removing the USC from the first €45,000 a person earns.

For 2025, it is estimated that the USC will yield in the region of €5.6 billion. With regard to the proposal to abolish the USC for all those earning less than €70,000, I am advised by the Revenue Commissioners that it is estimated that this would cost in the region of €1.3 billion in the first year and €1.5 billion in a full year. It is estimated that 33% of all taxpayer units will not be liable to USC in 2025. Increasing the entry threshold to €70,000 per annum would exempt around 3 million or 86% of taxpayer units from the USC. The second proposal by the Rural Independent Group relates to abolishing the USC in its entirety. This was also proposed by Deputy Boyd Barrett.

With regard to Deputy Boyd Barrett’s proposal to introduce a wealth tax to offset the Exchequer shortfall, taxes on wealth are already in place. Various taxes operate, in effect, as wealth taxes in Ireland, and these include the local property tax, capital gains tax and capital acquisitions tax, as well as certain forms of stamp duty. The total net receipts for these various forms of tax came to just under €4.2 billion in 2023.

The 2022 report from the Commission on Taxation and Welfare has found that a new tax on net wealth, if desired, should not be introduced without attempting to substantially amend Ireland’s existing taxes on capital and wealth. Rather than introducing a specific tax on wealth, the commission noted it would be more effective to re-examine the primary existing forms of wealth tax, such as capital gains tax and capital acquisitions tax.

On the proposal of Deputies Doherty and Conway-Walsh, which is to remove the USC on the first €45,000 a person earns, I am advised it would be at an estimated cost of €1.56 billion in the first year and €1.8 billion on a full-year basis. It would mean that approximately 2.49 million or 71% of tax units would not be liable to the USC.

More broadly, Ireland has one of the most progressive personal income tax systems, which plays a crucial role in the process of income redistribution. A redistribution tax system has been acknowledged by the IMF, the OECD and, indeed, the ESRI. The budget package we introduced is built around three key pillars: changes to tax credits, the standard rate band, and the USC. The Government has sought to use each of these levers to spread the benefit of the package as effectively as possible. Following the discussion on the USC amendments, the section on the income tax package has an estimated cost of €1.1 billion in 2025 and approximately €1.3 billion in a full year. For 2025, the main tax credits would be increased by €125, which represents a 6.7% rise. The personal tax credit will increase to €2,000 in the case of single persons and to €4,000 for married people and civil partners who are jointly assessed for tax. The value of both the employee tax credit and the earned income tax credit will also increase, by €125 from €1,875 to €2,000.

It is important to note that approximately 76,600 taxpayer units will be removed from the income tax net. These changes ensure many low-income earners will continue to remain outside the income tax net as incomes rise. A single person earning €20,000 or less in 2025 will now be outside the income tax net.

I could go on about this but I just want to come back to some of the other points made by Deputies. Deputy Ó Cuív, who has just left the Chamber, referred to a variety of revenue costings concerning individuals who hold a medical card. I will revert to him on this.

Some have raised the effective tax rates across our economy, as have been set out. According to the latest figures, from 2022, the top 10% of companies paid 12%. Deputy Boyd Barrett and Murphy raised this and I can send them the information.

Under pillar 2, a minimum effective tax rate of 15% has been in force for turnover over €750 million for accounting periods commencing on 31 December 2023, and this reflects the changes in the international taxation landscape. The OECD agreement, when implemented, is such that there is a risk of a net cost to the Exchequer in terms of reduced tax receipts in time. We believe, however, that our involvement is a price worth paying to provide stability and predictability regarding Ireland’s role in the international tax framework. The estimated cost of joining both pillars has previously been published. Ireland has a small, open economy connected to the rest of the EU and, indeed, many other global trading partners, and that is why we have to maintain a competitive position when it comes to personal and corporate tax. What makes us attractive is not just our tax rate. We are also English-speaking, we provide access to the EU market, we have a young, educated workforce, and we have a common law jurisdiction, all of which continue to attract foreign direct investment.

Much has been said about Ireland’s corporate tax regime in recent years. However, a few of the facts are often left out of the discussion. Ireland’s corporate tax policy and broader industrial policy have been consistently focused on attracting real and substantial investment, creating jobs and promoting prosperity. Our corporation tax regime has been an important part of our offering to indigenous businesses and foreign direct investors and it cannot be taken for granted.

As I said, the strengths we are admired for cannot be taken for granted, in terms of the talent of our workforce, the quality of our education system and how it connects with industry, our stable political system and the wider predictability around tax policy, which are central to ensuring we continue to run budgetary surpluses. This way, we can continue to invest in our economy and support the more than 2.7 million workers working in the economy and recognise the important value of our current tax policy. Our workforce is central to driving that.

I addressed some of Deputy Boyd Barrett's points around the wealth tax. If the Deputy looks at what the Commission on Taxation and Welfare has set out, he will see that there are options regarding existing capital taxes. We must, however, maintain a competitive position when it comes to corporate tax and the other capital taxes in our economy.

Deputy Aindrias Moynihan raised a number of issues, some of which related to USC. He also raised the issue of inheritance tax with regard to a couple who do not have children but wish to leave their property to their niece or nephew and the exemptions or reliefs available to them. The relief is there and we have made an adjustment to the thresholds around these reliefs in categories A, B and C in the budget. It is also worth noting that there is an exemption from CAT where dwelling houses are bequeathed by individuals who have lived there for a specified period of time before the inheritance, who will continue to live there for a specified period of time after the inheritance and those who have no beneficial interest in any other residential property on the date of the inheritance.

Deputy Troy raised specific queries relating to the help-to-buy scheme. I will revert to him directly on that. I know he has submitted parliamentary questions to me on this in the context of the existing legislation. Others have raised the issues of housing supply and the decision the Government made around increasing and revising our housing targets. If we look at where we have come from over the past four years, a number of years ago, more than 20,000 homes were being built per annum. That figure is now heading towards 40,000, which is above our Housing for All targets for 2024. We have set out ambitious and deliverable targets for the next number of years to make sure we deliver affordability, hope and a greater housing supply in our economy for many young workers who want to buy and own their own home.

Many Opposition politicians would abolish many of the schemes that help people, including the help-to-buy and first home schemes. We have set out for the Minister for housing, Deputy O'Brien, a revised target of 41,000 new homes in 2025 with a trajectory to 2030. It is an ambitious and incredible pathway to support increased housing supply in our economy. The national planning framework will underpin that. It will be an issue when we set out our stall in the coming days during the general election campaign.

Deputies McAuliffe and Shortall raised an issue they have raised with me previously. I will set out some of the detail as regards GP Care for All. I am familiar with Dr. O'Carroll who has been a fantastic GP in his community and a wonderful advocate for healthcare for people in Dublin and a leader in healthcare in the country. A particular practice model has been highlighted whereby incorporated charities such as GP Care for All operate a medical practice while employing GPs to provide clinical services. In such models, it appears the employee GP's income under GMS contracts has, to date, been incorrectly treated as the income of a medical practice in which the individual GP is an employee rather than income of that individual GP. It also appears the HSE made the GMS payments into the bank account nominated by the relevant GP, which is an account for medical practice rather than an account of the GP. This has led to a perception by such medical practices that the HSE, by making payments to the nominated bank account, is approving the reassignments of earnings in some way. The Department of Health has confirmed that this does not change the legal position, which remains that the individual GP is the person being contracted and is therefore paid for the GMS contract, regardless of who owns the bank account in which the GP has nominated to receive the GMS income. As such, that individual GP has always been and remains the chargeable person as regards taxation of income arising under the contract.

Section 1008A is being perceived as a change to the legal position for all GP practices. That is not the case. The provision did not change the underlying legal position that the individual GP is the chargeable person as regards income arising under the GMS contract. Revenue issued guidance notes during 2023 clarifying the correct tax treatment of GMS income under tax legislation. Although the guidance was widely reported as a proposed tax change, it does not introduce a change to the tax treatment of GPs. Instead, it simply clarifies the existing legal and administrative position.

When section 1008A was introduced in the Finance (No. 2) Act 2023, it was noted it was expected to resolve some, but not all, of the issues arising from contractual arrangements. This is because there are a number of business arrangements and models in the GP sector, including partnerships, companies, employees and employers. It was further noted, therefore, that the Department of Health had agreed to this approach and had confirmed that the strategic review of general practice, which is currently under way, would examine the relevant HSE contracts and propose measures necessary to modernise them. Although I am conscious of the difficulties being experienced by GP practices, it is important to set out the wider legislative context and the fact that there was not a change here. I have also been engaging with my colleague, the Minister for Health, Deputy Donnelly, on the matter.

On the specific issue relating to GP Care for All, which is an important service in the community it serves, I understand the Department of Health and the HSE have met representatives of GP Care for All on four separate occasions in an effort to find a solution to the issue. I am informed that it was made clear during the early engagements that the Department and the HSE value the work of GP Care for All and their focus was ensuring the continued delivery of services. That engagement is ongoing between the parties and is focused on a model of funding or an operating structure that would allow GP Care for All to deliver its services on a sustainable footing. I understand that is the current position.

Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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The Minister could facilitate it.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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Sorry?

Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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You could facilitate a change-----

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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We have set out the-----

Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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You facilitated corporate bodies for general practice.

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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There has been no legal or administrative change. They are working together to try to deliver an operating model that allows them to continue that important work.

Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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A taxation change is required.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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We will move on. I pay tribute to Deputy Shortall. I know many TDs are retiring but I think the Deputy's history is unprecedented in the history of the Dáil, with 32 years as a female TD. I do not think it has happened in the history of the Dáil. Comhghairdeas agus go n-éirí léi. It is important to acknowledge that.

Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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Thank you very much, a Leas-Cheann Comhairle.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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And so say all of us.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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Well done, Deputy Shortall.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I will go back to the list. Deputy McGrath is at the top of it.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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I would like to be associated with the tribute to an Teachta Shortall. Thirty-two years is a long time. What is the song? Twenty-one years is long but 32 years is much longer for a female. Well done to the Deputy. I wish her the best of luck.

We have been around the Houses and the Minister has had his backbenchers in to praise his fiscal policy. If any ordinary business person operated that way, they would not be in business. I mean no disrespect to the Minister in saying that. The problem with the Government, as I see it, is that there is not one business person in the Cabinet or among the junior Ministers. As I said earlier, the Government has the same advisers, which are the big names that are wheeled out all the time. No matter what it is, whether it is investigating RTÉ or looking into reports, it is the same people, the same consultants on the same gravy train. They are the same people who advise the Minister, his predecessors and the Government. He is new in the role.

It is gimmickry, codology and mockery to give people payments. It is the same with the business scheme. Many people missed out last year and will now miss out again this year. I do not have the acronyms of the new schemes but the Minister knows what I am talking about. All business people, but especially those with small businesses, are hard pressed and very busy. Small businesses do not have staff to deal with the Government's schemes, meet deadlines and answer trick-and-a-loop questions where if they miss out by an hour, they are out.

The schemes are a failure. The Minister is giving payments to people. As I said, the Government promised to abolish the USC. I am not sure about Fianna Fáil but Fine Gael definitely promised to abolish it. How many ways are there to skin a cat? As I said, there is absolutely no difference now between Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael.

They are trying to create a difference now for the electorate.

It is a punitive tax. I hate quoting the dead former Taoiseach, Albert Reynolds, God rest him, who said this tax was a temporary little arrangement. That was the expectation. People put their shoulders to the wheel, as unpalatable as it was, because the IMF was dictating policy here. It came in and people paid it. Our amendment wants to remove people earning up to €45,000 and have a report and critical analysis done as to the impacts and come back with the results of the painful amounts of money the people paid. Our request was to have an examination of the pressure it is putting on people and the lack of spending power they had in other areas because of this tax. If they had that in their pockets and were able to spend it, they might feel valued and that their work paid, that it pays to work and that it must be rewarding to go to work. They would spend that in the economy. Of course they would. This Government has thrown many small businesses to the wind and to the wolves and they are closing. I heard a report this morning on "Morning Ireland" that a shocking number of businesses have closed this year. Why can the Government not see it? They would be able to spend that money in those small businesses, whether they be cafes, restaurants, public houses, beauticians, hairdressers, barbers or you name it. They spend the money and it goes around, not into Government coffers, where it is wasted on the shocking gravy train of waste. I could go through a litany of them here with the children's hospital as the most disgraceful of all. There is the delay in the roll-out of broadband. There are the different metro schemes in Dublin. They have been talking about them for decades and the cost of anything the Government does is unbelievable. To think that Department of integration officials and the OPW could sit down in a room with me and tell me that modular cabins would cost €200,000 in a site provided by the HSE in Clonmel and would not cost any more. We now find out, four or five months later, that they will cost €446,000. I pointed out at the time that €200,000 was an outrageous amount of money. They are hardly worth €70,000. The waste goes on and on. The Taoiseach talks about €26 billion now in the HSE, up from whatever. Up and up it goes, and they have all these staff. How many of those staff are front-line doctors and nurses? What about the people waiting for orthodontic treatment and waiting for assessment for autism? What about Cara Darmody from Ardfinnan, County Tipperary, who is up here campaigning? I am sure that young girl will be here again tomorrow. What about all the different groups here daily begging and pleading, not for special treatment but for fairness? No, the special treatment is for the REITs and big businesses.

There is also the failure in housing. The backbenchers spoke about housing. Deputy English said there are more coming back into the country than going out. They are. Many of them are economic migrants, and people coming in here-----

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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No, I was referring to people from here.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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Can I continue? Many of them are coming in here for refugee status and many are economic migrants. They will be coming back in. If the Government members are honest with themselves, they know from knocking at the doors they are meeting parents who have tears in their eyes because their brightest and best and loved ones are abroad. They have married, settled down and are having children and grandchildren abroad. That is the reality because they cannot afford to get a house. They cannot afford to buy a house. They cannot afford to put a deposit together. In the country, where they have the wherewithal and can get a mortgage, they cannot get planning permission because of Government policies and what the Greens have done. The Greens have the tail wagging the dog that you lay down on every single policy. These kinds of sops and once-off payments and double payments are gone like snow off a ditch the day after. The bleak period in January will come after Christmas and people will be under twice the pressure. Who comes in then? The moneylenders. The Government has no interest in fairness. Fianna Fáil used to be the party of the little people like the ordinary PAYE workers, small business and small farmers but it has abandoned that completely to big business, the moguls, the beef barons and you name it. That is who Fianna Fáil now protects. Our earlier amendment was to stop the vulture funds but no, it could not do that.

I refer to what the Government is allowing in respect of four in every ten homes built. Goodness knows the difficulty in getting them built, given the costs and not having enough tradesmen. We have not enough skilled people and we have not the wherewithal to build the houses and reach the targets promised by the Government, which it keeps on breaking. It keeps on making more targets as announced again today. It will break them again. It has no sense of shame whatsoever. It could tackle that as well. There was a fight before the budget when kites were flown by one of the Ministers of State - I think it was Deputy Richmond - that stamp duty was going to be put up to 20% for those people buying four in every ten new homes built in this city and every other city. For me, that is 40% of them. Lots of young people who are saving and living in apartments and flats paying massive rents could have some chance of competing there, but no, these people are coming in. Did the Government increase the stamp duty to 20%? It went to 15% and it deserves a clap on the back. The Rural Independent Group and I wanted 50%, because these people should not be allowed buy our homes. These are companies from Canada and America. We had a proposal in our pre-budget submission that unless they are from Ireland, are providing employment or have good reason to be here, then they could not be allowed buy up these houses. Try to house our own Irish.

I walked down Grafton Street to Clarendon Street today. I thought I had seen it all but people were stopping. There was a poor individual lying in an alleyway in his clothes and covered all over in tin foil to keep out the rain. There was seagull pulling and pecking and tearing at it. I never saw anything like it. I took a photograph. I eventually went and hunted the seagull. It was pulling it away and he was trying to pull it back. My goodness. That is a real vulture, and they are the kinds of vulture this Government allows; the grey crows that destroy the lambs. How does the Minister sleep in his bed at night thinking of the ordinary people, and throwing sops here and there? He talks about the working men who go to work in the morning and they are pilloried. They do not get anything. They do not get the SUSI grants, the medical cards, the GP cards or the back to school allowance. They get nothing and they are pilloried and crucified. They do not get the double payments or the bonuses. Why should they not get them? They are the people who pay the taxes to pay all of our wages, mine included. No, the Government decides to support people who in some cases do not want to work. There are many people who are not able to work and I understand that totally. The Government talks about full employment and throws out this money just to buy the election. It is nothing short of it.

Both parties have had power now since the inception of the State. There was the codology of confidence and supply for four years, and now Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are in a hybrid or a tandem or whatever you like. They cannot separate the hybrid or cut the tandem in half now to go out to the people again. They have lost their identities and morphed into one. They are serving the European economic masters of Brussels and the World Economic Forum. People ask me how they can stay there and do that and sit back and pass it off. They are not serving the Constitution that elected them to this House. They are not serving the Irish people. They are not serving under the oath of office they have to serve and look after our people. They are more interested in prancing around the world stage and being the good boys in Europe and for big multinational conglomerates. That is who they want to serve now and they have lost their identity completely from the days of the founding members like Lemass and others. They have lost it completely.

In this situation, they are praising paltry payments and singing about them, and they are in the newsletters that are going out. Some of the respected backbenchers suggested that we were welcoming it as well on social media. I certainly was not anyway. As a business person since 1982, I know what it is like. I know a gimmick when I see a gimmick. If it walks like a duck, it is a duck. It is quack-quack here, quack-quack there and quack-quack everywhere with the Government. Hopefully when they meet the geese and the ducks, they will meet a few ganders as well and they might put manners on them if nobody else will, because they are well able to. They are not serving the ordinary working people or ordinary struggling families who are trying to pay for school uniforms and bus tickets.

These people cannot get anything. They work and work. There was a great man in my parish, in County Port Láirge but it was my parish, who made a statement 20 years ago. He was called Jeremy Hallahan. He said he used to work in the woods felling timber and taking it out with horses in awful conditions on high ground that could not be traversed by anything else. He told me only fools and horses were working now and as most of the horses were nearly dead, that would leave the fools. That is how people feel. They are not being rewarded, respected or supported. They are not getting any fair crack of the whip at all - although they get up early in the morning and go to work - none. What happens if the Government disincentivises people from working? They do not work. Then you have situations where the second and third generations are not working. It is an unequal and unfair situation.

I am not even talking about the Minister's outright and blank refusal to tackle the super-rich, to have taxes on them. They are people who have done good work, were creative and were successful enough to become billionaires but they need to be paying their fair share. The Minister, however, will not touch them under any circumstances. I would say that under threat of death the Minister would not tax them, whatever hold they have over the Government. It is a sad country. We fought so dearly to get our freedom here and now the Government is beholden to all these people, such as the World Economic Forum and our European masters. That is what it is doing.

Commissioner McGrath is in an inquisitorial situation today for a fanciful position in justice. That is all the Government gets, sops from Europe. We saw with the bailout what we got from our friends in Europe. We got money at 2.9% from the IMF and we paid almost 6% to our so-called friends in Europe. Mar fhocal scoir, I remind the Minister why the USC is here. It is because of the bailout when the Government let off major investments and people in here who had insurance bonds. I had many an argument with the late Brian Lenihan over this.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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The Deputy might let, with the time, some of the other people here speak.

Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour)
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We have not had sufficient-----

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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If he could; if he would not mind.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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I said to the Leas-Cheann Comhairle-----

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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Dúirt sé-----

Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour)
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People who in all my years in the Dáil have not appeared at a finance committee hearing at all or the consideration of a Finance Bill.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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The Deputy is not listening. Dúirt sé "mar fhocal scoir". Bhí sé díreach chun chríochnú.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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Mar fhocal scoir. I did.

I said the major bondholders went off scot-free, although they had insurance bonds, so the Irish people were doubly robbed by the bailout and the USC the Government promised it would get rid of.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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This is what happens when a Finance Bill is guillotined. We end up with a shambolic Committee Stage where there is no actual scrutiny of the Bill and everyone is forced to try to shoehorn in any points they want to make into the first grouping of amendments. That is what has happened today. People have no choice at this stage. There is very little time left. They want to raise issues and had there been proper scrutiny of the Bill, we would not have this. Certain people who spent a lot of time talking would not even have gone down to a committee meeting because it is not the Dáil Chamber, not in front of the cameras really, so they would not have bothered. We all know who would and would not have been there to do proper scrutiny of the Bill.

Anyway, we are where we are. There is very little time left. As a mover of an amendment in this grouping, I have made the main arguments. The argument we are making is that the USC was supposed to be an emergency, temporary tax, which was always unfair because workers paid the bill for the crimes of bankers and developers. It was never fair but that is why it was introduced. Workers picked up the bill for the crimes of others. As bad as that was, it was supposed to be temporary. The promises to get rid of it and that it would only be temporary have been reneged upon and workers are still having this imposed on them. Now we are told it is unrealistic to get rid of it. How can it be unrealistic to get rid of something that the Government itself stated it would get rid of? Pretty much anyone who is being in any way objective would say it was unfair in the first place and resulted only from the fact that there was a financial crash that was generated by the banks and developers and the politicians who allowed them to run riot in the housing sector.

By the way, talking about the current housing crisis, it would not exist were it not for all the crimes that were committed back then and the politicians who facilitated them. The workers paid the bill via the USC and the working people of this country paid the bill with the housing crisis that persists. It gets worse every day and there is no sign anywhere on the horizon that it will be fixed any time soon. That is the consequence. It seems to me that a Government with a record surplus kind of owes it to the working people to make up for all the pain they had to take and to try to resolve those problems and address that inequity. The people who caused the crash and the housing crisis are making profits again. The banks are back making big profits. The property developers, many of the well known names can be seen plastered around Dublin on building sites, are back making big money again on massively overpriced property that no ordinary person can afford. Would it not be fair for them to pay tax on their excess wealth in excess of €4.7 million? That is the proposal for the wealth tax we and groups such as Oxfam have put forward. The 20,000 people who have more than €4.7 million in personal wealth would pay a little tax on that and that would pay to get rid of the USC for workers who earn less than €100,000. It seems fair and entirely realistic to do that.

Do not tell me - this is the Government's argument - that they would run for the hills as they would lack incentives. Where are the incentives for the nurses, teachers, the ushers and service officers in here or the tens of thousands of public servants or retail workers in this country? I was looking at the figures from the CSO on average earnings in different sectors of the economy. For those who work in food or retail, average earnings are €10,000 per year. For those who work in the arts, average earnings are €16,000 per year. Hundreds of thousands of working people are living in poverty. We proposed a refundable tax credit for those 20% of workers who earn less than €18,750 per year because they do not benefit from tax credits. We said they should have a refundable tax credit. That could also be paid for with a little bit of wealth tax, to actually help the working poor, of whom there are hundreds of thousands. It is not unrealistic to say we could do that. Do what we promised: get rid of the USC, be fair to workers who had that imposed on them and ask the multimillionaires to pay a little extra tax so that working people can get some reward for the work they do.

In the short time available, I will mention another amendment we will not get to, as others have done. It relates to the film tax credit. As we speak today, there are film workers before the Labour Court, some of whom have worked 25 years, some 30, some 35 and some 40 years in the film industry. It is as though it never happened, however, apart from the fact that their names are on the credits of the films for all of those years.

It did happen. They did work on those films and the Government subsidised the production of the films through section 481 and its predecessor, section 35. The film workers, who are in the Labour Court at the moment fighting for the recognition of their service to the industry over all those decades, estimate that since 1984, when the first of these film tax credits was brought in, about €4.5 billion has gone to the film producers. These credits go to the companies of the film producers. In Ireland, that is dominated by a handful of film companies. The big names include Metropolitan Films, World 2000 Entertainment Limited, Element Pictures and so on. They are the biggest recipients and beneficiaries of the section 481 film tax credit, which is now running at about €100 million a year.

Does the Minister know what the shocking thing is? Let us take Metropolitan Films as an example, but Element Pictures is the same. When the workers who have worked for them on successive productions for decades go into the Workplace Relations Commission or the Labour Court and say they have worked on five, ten, 15 or 20 films that were made by Metropolitan Films and they have been unfairly blacklisted and dismissed from the industry, Metropolitan Films or Element Pictures says it is not the workers' employer. The designated activity company, DAC, which was set up for that film production is their employer. Metropolitan Films accepts that it set up the DAC, but that is different. The State gives the film producer - Metropolitan, Element or whatever it might be - the money. The film producer sets up a DAC for the film and then disassociates itself from the DAC and says it does not employ anybody. The consequence is that people who have spent 20, 30 or 40 years in the industry have no recognition of service whatsoever because they are employed by these DACs, even though they are associated companies wholly owned by the company the Minister gives the money to.

Under any objective view of company law and the relationship between companies, subsidiaries and so on, these DACs are subsidiaries of the companies the Minister gives the money to, and he gives the money to them specifically for the provision of quality employment, what is called the industry development test. In fact, the European Union only allows the Minister to give money to the film producers under state aid rules on the basis that he will create an industry and provide quality employment and training, but the people he gives it to say they do not have any employees. He gives it to them to create employment and then when the employees say the producers are their employer, they say they do not have employees. It is as if they never existed in the industry.

There is no industry, but €4.5 billion has gone to these film companies since 1984. Workers, therefore, are totally vulnerable. They can basically be blacklisted out of the industry if they say boo on a film set or if they say they do not want to work dangerously excessive hours or assert their right under the fixed-term workers Act to carry their service from one film production to another. If they do that, they will be blacklisted and then when they go to the Labour Court about their blacklisting, they will be told the production company is not their employer and, in fact, nobody knows who their employer is or that it is a DAC that briefly existed and then disappeared.

That is outrageous and this Government has allowed it to happen. Successive governments have allowed it to happen. I do not know how many times I have spoken about this to various Ministers for Finance and it just carries on and on. There is simply no protection for the workers. There is a very simple solution to this issue, which was proposed by the Committee on Budgetary Oversight. It is that the Minister would set down as a precondition of giving the money to the film producers that they acknowledge the service of workers who have worked across different DACs as their employees if they were set up by the same producer company. It is simple. If the Minister does not do that, the fixed-term workers Act means nothing and the workers have absolutely no rights, no recognition of service and might as well not have existed. As they put it, the clock goes back to zero in terms of their employment record at the end of every film production. It is as if they never worked before in the industry, even though they have worked in it for decades. That leaves them totally vulnerable.

The other group demanding reform by the Minister of section 481 includes the actors, performers, writers and directors, that is, the people who actually do the performance or create the performance with their writing or direction. They have repeatedly said to the Minister, or his predecessors, that they are not getting fair and reasonable remuneration for their performances because they are forced to sign buyout contracts where the downstream revenues those films generate accrue to the producers, even though their performances, under copyright directives and legislation, should mean they benefit from downstream revenues. In other words, they should not just be given a once-off payment and forced to sign away their rights to the downstream revenues of a film if it does well. In that sense, films are unusual because it is not just a case of getting paid for the work on the day. If a film is very successful, as some Irish films are, they then potentially generate revenue for years. At the moment, workers are being told they will not get on a film unless they sign a buyout contract where they have to waive their right to the downstream revenues and if they dare to question that, they will not get on the film. That is it. That is a breach of their rights under the copyright legislation. It also states in EU directives that buyout contracts are supposed to be the exception, not the rule. In Ireland, they are the rule.

That also means Irish actors, writers and performers are on lesser contracts than, for example, their UK counterparts under the PACT Equity agreement. They have asked repeatedly that the Government insist that film producers use the PACT Equity agreement used in Britain as the blueprint for the contract for writers, actors, performers and others on film productions. The Minister can crack that whip because he gives them the money. It should be very simple. He can just say they are not getting the money unless they recognise the service of the crew, give them their rights and ensure that writers, actors, performers and directors will benefit from the downstream revenues of their performances or their creative contribution to those film productions.

I remind the Minister of what I said earlier. Most artists, writers, directors and performers live in poverty. Most people who work in arts in this country live in poverty, not the film producers, but the people who do most of the work. I appeal to the Minister to make those changes to section 481, which I have asked for many times. More importantly, the people who work in the film industry and the writers and directors have asked repeatedly that those changes be made. The workers will end up in court because, again, Metropolitan Films said today that it is not their employer, even though it set up the company that employed them or that it says employed them, but actually it was Metropolitan saying it is not their employer. The company knows them well. They have worked on all its film productions. It is laughable, shocking and disgraceful, but it goes on. I will leave it at that. I know other Members wish to contribute.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I point out to Members that there are six speakers left in just 32 minutes.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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I apologise, a Leas-Cheann Comhairle.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I am just pointing it out generally. There are possibly seven speakers.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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If the Government had not imposed a guillotine, we would not be in this mess.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I appeal to Members. There are six, possibly seven, speakers. I will read out the names so we know who they are. The list of names as I have it is Deputies Michael Collins, Danny Healy-Rae, Canney, Doherty, Michael Healy-Rae and English.

Michael Collins (Cork South West, Independent)
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I will try to be brief. I will only speak for two to three minutes to give everybody else a chance. It is unfortunate that there is a guillotine here and we will not get an opportunity to speak on so many issues relating to the budget that are of great importance to the people of our country. It is a terrible situation that we have been forced into. There has been quite a lot of discussion about the USC, which is a very unfair tax on the people out there. The Minister will say tax is needed but there are so many taxes out there today. It is hitting the ordinary, low-paid workers who see that charge being taken out of their pay packet every week, a charge that the Government and others promised to abolish but the Government has just added to people's misery by leaving it there. Low-income workers feel the pinch and the Minister had an opportunity in this budget to turn that around by exempting many of them from the charge but unfortunately, he did not see fit to do so.

A lot of business people are caught up in drastic situations. The VAT9 campaign is of serious interest to many. The Minister was in Kinsale recently and I was surprised that he did not go and meet a lot of those business people in west Cork who have been hit very badly when he had the opportunity. He should not shy away from the real people who are in dire situations. They are paying for energy, rates, staff, water and food. Cafés are closing down one after another and the Minister has stood idly by and allowed it to happen. It is happening all over Ireland but in particular, in my own constituency in west Cork. Numerous cafés and businesses have closed. The VAT9 group put forward some very good, strong recommendations but the Minister failed to take them on board. He has left small businesses, including cafés, restaurants, hairdressers, pubs and others in a dire situation.

Accountability is important. It is okay to say that the universal social charge is there and that we need that money to pay for lots of things but there is no accountability regarding where the money is going in this country. People are crying out for accountability. They see €9 million for phone pouches, a children's hospital where millions and millions of euro have been spent and the budget has been overrun, the bike shed here and different things that are a cause of great concern. They want to know where their money is going. This country has money and there is no point in saying otherwise but where it is spent is the issue. There are issues like wastewater. Uisce Éireann has got an extra €1 billion but where is that money going to go? I got a report from the Minister recently, which told me that wastewater projects in Shannonvale in Clonakilty, Rosscarbery, Dunmanway, Ballydehob or Goleen will have to wait. They do not even know if they will be in the 2025 to 2029 plan. That means there is no plan because if there was one, they would know about it straight away. Every time we meet Uisce Éireann we are told it does not know if these projects will be in the plan. Imagine swimming around in wastewater. It is inhumane. There is money available. The country is awash with money but there is absolutely no accountability.

Quite a lot of Members spoke about means-testing for the carer's allowance. Lots of people are being hit very hard that do not deserve to be hit. These are people who are working hard and who are looking after loved ones, neighbours or friends but for one reason or another - maybe some small bit of an extra payment at home if their partner is working - they are blocked from getting the allowance. That is a very unfair situation that the Minister should have considered especially when the country, as so many have said, has lots of money. Why has the money not gone to people like that who are hurting hard? The Government has taxes like the USC but also the carbon tax and motor tax, which hit those in rural communities, including farmers, very badly. There are difficulties being heaped onto fishermen. When there was a fuel rebate available for fishermen, the Government would not even apply for it and bring it into them to give them an opportunity. All in all, the Minister has a lot of money but an awful lot of money is being wasted in this country, as far as I am concerned. One thing that we will be going after very strongly is accountability for where the money is being spent. People should at least know where their hard-earned taxes are going. This country is taxing people into the ground.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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Deputy Danny Healy-Rae is next. There are just 26 minutes left for the debate.

Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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In relation to spending money, taxes and USC, we have said previously that it is very important that people realise that when their money is being spent, it is being wasted. When the Government talks about housing - and it surely has done a lot of talking about housing - there is one avenue that it has not explored. We all know that there are so many vacant houses around the country, right under our noses. Each and every one of us knows that. The Government could utilise them if it allowed the same discretion to Irish people. What I mean by that is we should allow Irish people to avail of the same exemption and pay landlords the €850 tax-free sum in the same way as is done for the Ukrainian people. I am not asking that the Government stops that for them but that it gives the same leeway and the same allowance to Irish people. These are local people. They are not all Irish. There are people living here from many other countries for 20 years or more and they are on the housing list as well. To help all of them, the Government must create a level playing pitch and give the same allowance to them as it is giving to Ukrainians. A lot of house owners would avail of that because the rules are very different and the RTB is not involved. The RTB is the cause of many house owners not renting out their properties. When the RTB gets involved, your house is not your own any more. It is different with the Ukraine scheme and I am asking the Government to adapt it and use it. The Government would be able to utilise a multitude of houses in many different areas in a very short time because the houses are there. They do not have to be built. Many of them are perfectly good houses. I ask the Minister to allow that same exemption to the people on the waiting lists in this country. Many of them are on the list for up to 15 years, which is absolutely ridiculous. We are telling people with young families when they go on the housing list in Killarney, east Kerry, Kenmare or Killorglin that they will probably have to wait ten years before they are housed by the local authority. The Government would not be paying out as much HAP or rent allowance. There is an awful lot of work in administering those schemes. Even when people get HAP, they have to wait two or three months. There are housing officials involved for ages and it takes a long time to process. I ask the Government to consider this. I have been raising it for almost two years and was the very first Deputy to mention it. I am asking the Government to be fair. All we are asking in every case is for the Government to treat people fairly. Those who have been on the housing list for many years are not getting a fair crack of the whip. I ask the Minister to give the same allowance to those people.

Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent)
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First, I want to speak to the issue of the universal social charge. As many TDs have said, this was a temporary measure that was brought in at a time there was a call on people who were working to try to save this country. We have gone on too long taking this money and need to put a stop to this unworkable charge on people's earnings. It does not bear any resemblance to fairness any more. Working people have paid their due for the folly of others and it is time that we put a plan in place to phase out the USC completely.

We need a policy to finish that tax. These people have paid enough.

I met a man at his door while canvassing yesterday. He spoke with a slight bitterness about the fact that he was still working and doing everything right but still could not access grants for his children, who are going to college. He and his wife have to work to pay for their mortgage. He mentioned all of these kinds of things. He said that the one-off payments he gets are like giving a sweet to a child. It is not doing anything for the working person. It is important that we show respect to the working person.

We have submitted an amendment, which we will not get to, in respect of VAT. I have spoken to many people in small industries in my constituency of Galway East. I am fearful that they are looking at an opt-out clause to get out of business. They feel that to have a business and to keep a coffee shop or whatever else going is costing them far more than they can earn. One of the things they said to me was that they can get a grant or a top-up, like the €4,000, which as I mentioned earlier is not available to everybody, and that needs to be addressed. Those people are paying rates that are not based on profit or anything other than the size of the floor area of their building. That is penal. These small businesses, including butchers, bakeries, hairdressers and all the other businesses, may not be huge employers but they employ many people across this country and give employment to young people when they are going to college. They train people and give them personal skills that nobody else can give them. Yet we are using small businesses again and not giving them the respect they need. Some of them will leave the market. One young businessman, who has been in business for five years, told me that if he knew then what he knows now about trying to run a business, he would never have started it.

The minimum wage is something that governments announce to suggest they are giving something to people. When they announce an increase in the minimum wage, everybody else who is working in a business must get a lift to his or her wages. It is costing a fortune to keep that going.

There are many things we need to do but we do not have enough time to talk about them today. I thank the Leas-Cheann Comhairle for her patience.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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I have submitted many amendments to the Bill. I am wondering why I went through this 274-page document in detail given that the guillotine is looming. I regret that. The Bill should never have been brought out of committee. We should have dealt with the Bill in committee. We have always facilitated the Government in respect of the passage of the legislation. Even when the Government of the time wrecked the country and brought the International Monetary Fund, IMF, here, we facilitated the passage of legislation. This should not have happened. Parts of this legislation need scrutiny.

I am concerned for farmers in my constituency in respect of the residential zoned land tax. I do not see what the Minister has brought forward. When the Minister, Deputy Donohoe, brought this legislation before the committee, I pointed out that there was an issue for farmers. He said there was no such issue but it was clear that there was. When the then Minister, former Deputy Michael McGrath, brought forward an amendment to last year's Finance Bill, I said nothing was going to change and the issue would not be resolved. He thought it was okay but it was not. The Government scrambled before the end of the summer to come up with this as a solution but I do not think it cuts the mustard. We are not even going to get the chance to discuss section 113 because we are only on section 2. There are serious concerns. It does not appear to me that the issue has been resolved. The legislation allows people to apply for a rezone of land and if they apply, they are exempt. Is the Minister telling me that everybody who applies and does not have planning permission on their land will be exempt from this tax, regardless of whether they are farming? Perhaps the Minister can enlighten us on that point. How long does the exemption last? Does it last forever or does it last until a determination is made by the local authority that rezoning is being granted? What the Minister, Deputy Michael McGrath, did last time was to allow them to apply again for rezoning. Why are we not just exempting agricultural land that is in use? That is the most logical thing to do. The thing that should not be done is for this land, which is serviced, to be rezoned. If, for example, the farmer in question passed away and there was no agricultural activity on the land in the next number of years, it should come under a tax. However, for as long as it is being actively used in farming, there should be no whiff of a tax being applied. That is what we pointed out to the Government two years ago and we are still dealing with the issue. As happened with Deputies Donohoe and Michael McGrath, we are going to find there are issues with that section as it relates to farmers. It is a very detailed section that interacts with legislation that amends the Taxes Consolidation Act 1997. We still do not have a consolidated Act, but that is another issue. I am concerned about that issue.

I am also concerned about the issue I raised two years ago with the then Ministers, Deputies Donohoe and Michael McGrath, in respect of the loophole that existed for pensions. People were facilitated two years ago, through a loophole in the legislation, to load the pensions of their children or spouses so that they can get money out of a company, put it into the pension fund of their family members and use the taxation of that to draw down those funds. The first €200,000 is exempt and a rate of only 20% applies to the next €300,000. In fairness, the Revenue Commissioners said there was a problem and the Government has acknowledged that through this amendment. The issue was that it was not linked to the salary of the individual. Somebody could be employed temporarily. This is the situation until this legislation passes. If I own a shop and want to employ my partner, I can pay her the minimum wage and put €2 million from the company into her pension pot. The first €200,000 of that would be tax free and the next €300,000 would be taxed at a rate of €200,000. If I wanted to get that €2 million out of the company by other means, I would have to pay personal tax rates, USC, PRSI, etc., at a rough rate of 50%. That is a big problem. How the Government has dealt with the issue is insufficient. It has linked the amount that can be put into the pension by the employer to the wage. There is still, however, an incentive - and this is what I would have loved to tease out with the Minister on Committee Stage - for that employer to increase the wage of his or her partner in that year. It is not based on an average wage over a period but is based on the specific year. There is an incentive to increase the wage to allow for the money to pass into the pension. The employee will obviously benefit from tax reliefs in terms of pension contributions. The employer will benefit from being able to write off this contribution against his or her corporation tax. There is then the beneficial tax in relation to the first €200,000 lump sum being tax free and the 20% rate for the next €300,000. I do not know if that is deliberate or it is another loophole that the Government has left in the legislation. I am not sure, and we are not going to have time to go through it.

I again question why the Minister continues to provide tax relief for landlords. The standard fund threshold is simply unfair. It is unfair that this amount of money is being provided to people who already have gold-plated pensions. The only people are who benefiting are those who already have a pension pot of €2 million. That is a massive pension pot that no ordinary public sector worker would have a sniff of. The Minister wants not only to increase it to €2.8 million by 2030 but wants to go further. I did the calculations. This is one of the only measures in our tax code that is index linked. Personal tax bands are not index linked. Tax credits that workers get are not index linked. The incapacitated tax credit for people who have children with additional needs and disabilities is not index linked in our tax code. Social welfare rates are not index linked in the Social Welfare Act. However, if you have a pension pot of €2 million, we are going to index link it. We are going to ensure tax relief is available on that pension pot not just up to €2.8 million, which was in the Government's press release. The Minister wants it to go up 3% or 4% every year according to inflation.

On past performances, by 2038 that would be €4 million. Was it Bertie Ahern who said the boom times are getting boomier? Fianna Fáil is definitely back. Landlords, tick; vulture funds, tick; the wealthiest in society with massive pensions, tick. This is just not on. We are not getting a chance to scrutinise this at all.

I have an amendment here on the USC. This is an issue that really affects workers. As I said, we have made a commitment. I do not know what Fianna Fáil is going to do but nobody believes it, because it argued in the past that it would abolish it on everything under €80,000. We are very clear. The amendment is about making sure the average worker never pays the USC again, to make sure that every single worker never pays USC on the first €45,000 they earn. That is what the amendment proposes. I will be pressing that amendment if we have time today.

Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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There is no time as good as the present for gauging public opinion. I have been canvassing and knocking on people's doors and meeting them in their places of work. The one thing that is coming back - I am sure the Minister will be very interested in this, and I presume he is hearing it himself - is that people can pick good and bad out of the budget but the one thing that an awful lot of people are saying about the budget is there was nothing in the budget for working people, for people who are getting up in the morning, paying a mortgage, trying to rear a family and go to work. They find there was very little in the budget for them. When we talk about the universal social charge, we have to remember that the main political parties have something in common and that is both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have consistently said they would abolish it. They did not do so. They played with it you, messed with it but they did not abolish it. It was a temporary tax but unfortunately, like lots of things that are temporary, it does not take long for it to become permanent.

People are taxed to death. They have been taxed further with the carbon tax which I will remind people was supported by Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, the Green Party and Sinn Féin. Sinn Féin objected to it afterwards but supported it at the beginning. I will never forget what was said at the time-----

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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We voted against it.

Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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No, Sinn Féin supported it.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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No, we voted against it.

Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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I will put on the record what was actually said. I would like to think that my memory is fairly sharp. At the time it was said across the floor of this House, obviously not to the Minister but to the person in charge at the time, that he was not going far enough, fast enough. This was with regard to taxation on carbon. That was what Sinn Féin said at the time. That must be remembered. It is on the record of the Dáil.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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The Deputy was not even here when it was voted on. He did not turn up to vote on the Finance Bill.

Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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I am seeking the protection of the Ceann Comhairle because I do not want to take up too much time. However, I am making that point. That was said.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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I ask Deputy Doherty to restrain himself.

Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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On carbon tax, Sinn Féin said the Government was not going far enough, quick enough, and that is on the record of the Dáil. I would take that back if I were wrong but it is on the record of the Dáil that the leader of the Sinn Féin Party said at that time that the Government was not putting enough tax on people. Sinn Féin then came in here complaining about it afterwards. However, that is what it said at the time.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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It flip flops.

Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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It flip flops, yes Mattie.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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Half of the Rural Independents did not turn up for the vote.

Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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At present, when people look at the tax take out of their earnings they hurt very badly. When they go to the petrol pumps they hurt very badly because it is all tax, tax and more tax. As far as I can see, the Government is doing everything it can to penalise workers, to stop enterprise and to close down businesses. We asked - we actually begged - on behalf of people involved in business, to reduce the VAT rate. Those calls were ignored. The people are remembering that now when we call to the doors. They are asking why 615 restaurants closed. That is not taking into account all of the other small beautiful businesses, family businesses, for which mothers and fathers, grandparents and children put their shoulders to the wheel. They are shutting down because they cannot make ends meet. They cannot afford to keep going. There is no incentive for people to work at present. We want to keep people working. The one person, the man or woman, it could be a hairdresser or a mechanic in a small way doing a bit of welding in the backyard, we want to encourage that. We want to keep those great people going.

Sometimes a small business can grow into a big business. In County Kerry I think of great people such as those in Munster Joinery which started from very humble beginnings and now is a massive operation employing thousands of people and contractors, not just in Ireland but abroad as well. We have many examples of that in County Kerry, small businesses like Torc Precision Engineering, contractors like KPH Construction Services in Kenmare, organisations that started small and through diligence and hard work became bigger. They create employment and provide valuable services in the community. We want to see that type of business grow. However, there is no attitude in Government of supporting workers. There is not. The biggest problem in the Government is that so many of the Members themselves never employed people. They do not know what it is like to pay somebody on a Friday evening. I do not mean the Members personally, I mean the Government. It does not know what it is like to pay other people to do work and to try to keep a business going.

Shops, pubs and hotels are struggling. The people involved in a certain type of business, in hospitality, are struggling to keep their doors open. The Government does not actually get that. Will they get it after this election? I do not know. Work has to be rewarded. We have to reward enterprise. Not to do so on this Government’s watch or on the watch of the incoming Government will mean paying a very high price. Only so much tax can be drawn out of people before they eventually give up. They will say they are not going to do this anymore because it is all take and no give.

In regard to the incentives in the budget, I am not going to criticise anything that was given, but it is tokenism. What is being done to small businesses is tokenism. Talking about such things as energy rebates for households does not take away from the fact that energy costs have gone through the roof, because of the constant attack on our supply of electricity. The Government wants us to use more electricity while we produce less of it, at a higher cost. How many times have I to say that before it eventually hits home? Bringing in biomass material from Brazil and things like that is not exactly an answer to shutting down Bord na Móna. Such things will never be forgotten. It will be like long ago when Fine Gael took a farthing out of the old age pension. It was remembered for decades afterwards. The closure of Bord na Móna will be an epitaph that will never be forgotten.

One of the few times Eamon Ryan actually left Dublin during Covid-19 was to go down to get his picture taken for the closure of Bord na Móna. These things are ridiculous and make no sense. We are getting that on the doorsteps. The Government is missing all of that. It seems to have lost the understanding of the basic things that Ireland is about, whether it is fishing or farming. In Kenmare bay this evening pair trawling is going on. I am sure Members know what pair trawling is. It is where every bit of fish that is in the bay is sucked up. It is so bad at present in Kenmare that seals are dying of starvation. That is a fact. When we had a population of seals along Kenmare Bay, sea safaris used to go out to look at the seals on the rocks, falling around the place, jumping in and out of the water. That cannot happen now because they are dead, due to starvation. The small fishermen are left with nothing. There are no fish all along the coastline of Kenmare River because tonight pair trawling is well under way.

It is outrageous. The Government talks about the protection of the environment and it sides with the Greens on every type of rubbish but it will do nothing about pair trawling. It is plundering the seas; that is what it is doing. It makes no sense to suck up everything and then it is taken away, sent to a factory, mushed up and used as a meal. It is totally insane; all the different categories of fish are mushed up and made into a maize meal. It make no sense. Why is the Government not looking at things like that? It is more interested in stopping people cutting a sod of turf for their own fires. The Government has lost the run of itself. Environmentally, if the Green Party stood for anything, it would be shouting every day over there about pair trawling but it does not. It is more interested in a cow belching. That is what it is more worried about. It does not make sense. I do not like being critical of people. I would love it if the Government was doing a good job because I would stand up and say it did something good. If you want me to point out something it did do well, which I voted for and was proud that the Government did was the homeowners protection Act where if you were upstairs in your house and somebody came up the stairs to attack you, the Government did something about that. I was glad of that. I put that on the record tonight to show that if I see the Government do something right, I will praise and compliment it. My god, when I see it do something wrong, my job is to stand up for Kerry, farmers, fishermen, business and say it has lot the run of itself.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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The time permitted for this debate having expired, I am required to put the following question in accordance with an order of the Dáil of this day: "That the amendments set down by the Minister for Finance for Committee Stage and not disposed of are hereby made to the Bill and in respect of each of the sections undisposed of, with the exception of section 87, which is hereby deleted, or, as appropriate, the section as amended, is hereby agreed to in Committee, and Schedules 1 and 2, and the Title are hereby agreed to in Committee; the Bill, as amended, is accordingly reported to the House; Fourth Stage is hereby completed; and the Bill is hereby passed."