Results 301-320 of 1,054,327 for in 'Dáil debates' OR in 'Committee meetings' (speaker:Tom Kitt OR speaker:Róisín Shortall OR speaker:Jennifer Murnane O'Connor OR speaker:Jack Chambers OR speaker:Jackie Cahill OR speaker:Paschal Donohoe OR speaker:Éamon Ó Cuív)

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Paschal Donohoe: If the Deputy wants to reduce it to the understandable paradigm of the average person on the street, I think that if the average person on the street had a difficulty or their tax affairs were not in order, they would have a reasonable expectation they would be answering to the Revenue Commissioners about it and not to the Deputy. They would be dealing with it in private with the Revenue...

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Paschal Donohoe: -----but the Deputy did ask me a question, which I have answered.

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Paschal Donohoe: It is the same Central Bank that is also telling us not to overheat the economy. It is the same Central Bank that is telling us there are not enough workers in the economy to build the projects that we need and warning of capacity constraints. It is the same bank saying all of this. We have to listen to the other part of what it is saying, which is in addition to the part the Deputy is...

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Paschal Donohoe: Let me finish. That is what we are aiming to do by decisions that we may make in relation to infrastructure. Leaving aside the money that comes from the Apple judgment, the Government is already running surpluses and we have the ability to invest, but the Central Bank warns us in the same voice about not overheating the economy and we have to listen to that as well.

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Paschal Donohoe: I do not follow the Deputy’s line of questioning. On the one hand, he asked me if I am listening to the Central Bank and then, when I say that I have to listen to all of what the Central Bank says-----

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Paschal Donohoe: When I say that I have to listen to all of what the Central Bank has to say, the Deputy finds that a worrying admission. Any construction company that I meet, or any engineering company I go to, tells me that it cannot find the people it needs to do the work that is needed. That is just the reality we are facing as an economy at full employment. What the Government will do, and what we...

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Paschal Donohoe: It appears that whatever answer I gave, the Deputy would have predicted a decade of failure. What I believe we can do-----

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Paschal Donohoe: The people will have to make a call on that because a decade is a long time. I believe there is the prospect that if future governments can maintain the momentum that this Government has started, we will make progress on the delivery of more homes in a way that will make a big impact on the needs of our country and society. I am confident that we can do that.

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Paschal Donohoe: First, I acknowledge that working in our hospitals, particularly hospitals that are very busy, is demanding work and our public servants who do this do great work on our behalf in demanding circumstances. I acknowledge and thank them for the contribution they make in looking after those who are sick in our country. The agreement the Deputy is talking about is the agreement whereby we made...

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Paschal Donohoe: It is like any other part of our public service. The pay and numbers strategy is the same approach that we have for any other part of our public service, which is simply that given the availability of the money that you have, how many people do you expect you will be able to hire during the year and how many do you currently have recruited.

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Paschal Donohoe: We then require and depend on our public service to stay within those figures. With the amount of additional money that has been made available here, I challenge the Deputy with regard to how he can make the case that this is a negative development.

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Jack Chambers: I thank Deputy Healy-Rae. I will respond to some of the remarks on VAT in particular. I know the importance of hospitality and tourism, in particular for County Kerry and for many businesses across the country. We absolutely understand the pressure on businesses and small and medium enterprises in the hospitality sector in particular. We have a package of €1.4 billion available and...

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Paschal Donohoe: I will, but just before I do that I want to join the Minister for Finance, Deputy Chambers, in what he said about the Deputy's point about children with intellectual disabilities. We are all aware of how difficult this is for families and the challenges they have in accessing services despite our best efforts. We certainly acknowledge the importance of the point the Deputy made. On the...

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Jack Chambers: To the Deputy's earlier point, I am always ambitious for Mayo, as I know she is, in terms of infrastructure. None of us forget our roots, I can assure her. On a serious point, what we have published in August is in line with profile except for corporation tax receipts, which are obviously significantly above profile. We will set that out with the White Paper we will publish on the Friday...

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Jack Chambers: I will set that out in the White Paper, as is appropriate. It is important to set it out formally, as would be done in any given year.

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Jack Chambers: The summer economic statement is as we have set out in terms of the wider parameters and in terms of tax and expenditure policy, and our wider budgetary strategy remains the same. The White Paper will set out the answer to the Deputy's question. I do not want to give her a false figure.

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Jack Chambers: There is a deed of determination which was worked out when the escrow fund was established. The work has commenced on that by the NTMA and the Revenue Commissioners. I have been told it will take a number of months. There has to be a final figure settled on what it will amount to, but it certainly will not be before budget day, obviously. As we get that information, I will provide it to...

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Jack Chambers: It is a good question too.

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Jack Chambers: If we take the measures we have made from a tax perspective, for example, and the progressive nature of our decisions on tax over the last four years, a single person earning €40,000, for example, had an effective tax rate of 21% in 2020 and has an effective tax rate of 17% now. There has been a progressive nature to all of the decisions we have taken from a tax policy perspective....

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Pre-Budget Engagement (18 Sep 2024)

Paschal Donohoe: I am not familiar with what measure of material deprivation NERI are using so I cannot comment on the point the Deputy made, but I definitely am aware of the challenges of inequality within our society. That is the main reason we have ensured each of the budgets we have done has been progressive. As we have laid out each year in the budget, if we combine the core welfare rate changes that...