I am delighted to second this motion. I commend my colleague Deputy Ged Nash on proposing a mini-budget on behalf of the Labour Party in order to stand up, as he says, unapologetically for hard-pressed PAYE workers and their families, who have been left behind by the Government's policies. Ged has been a voice of reason as our finance spokesperson. He has consistently called out the crazy VAT cuts that the Government introduced for burger barons and big builders. Unlike the Government and uniquely among other parties, the Labour Party has opposed those VAT cuts. Indeed, we are against narrowing the tax base. As socialists and as a socialist party, we stand for transfer of wealth, for redistribution and for equality. Unlike the Government, we are not kite flying on issues such as inheritance tax and nuclear power. We are putting forward a costed and clear set of proposals, a mini-budget to help struggling households and families. Since the escalation of Trump's war in the Middle East and with Putin's continued assault on Ukraine, we have seen a cost-of-living crisis that is biting deeper for families and households across the country, with nearly half a million households now in arrears on energy bills as energy prices in Ireland skyrocket. There was confirmation this week of what we already knew: Irish electricity prices are the highest in Europe. Far too many households are feeling the pressure as we learn that rising costs are blowing a €2,000 hole in average household budgets this year. What has the Government done? It has withdrawn energy credits, it has not put any cushioning in place and it has failed to index tax bands. That is before we talk about its slashing of VAT for Supermac’s, with zero evidence that it would help households. Far too many are feeling the pressure every day at the till and in their bills. Despite working hard, they are being crushed by a cost-of-living crisis. This is no accident. It is down to the Government's policies. It is not an inevitability. We can look elsewhere, and I have called out the Taoiseach on this. The Government can look to Spain, where a socialist Government has ensured that Spanish households enjoy some of the lowest electricity prices in Europe. Why? It is because their Government invested heavily in renewables. By contrast, the Government's response to this crisis is to subsidise fossil fuels, further locking us into polluting, unreliable energy. The Government had other options. It had progressive options. It could do what we are proposing in this mini-budget and introduce a windfall tax on the energy profits of big companies, ensure that we have a real retrofitting revolution, ensure that households receive supports to fund the rollout of solar panels and ensure that we see wind power being generated at pace, instead of slowly and with delays. The Government’s crypto set of ad hoc measures should amount to a mini-budget but they do nothing for those who are struggling because the Government has no coherent vision for how to support them. It would have been more honest to call the drip-feed of measures what they are - a mini-budget released in segments - because that would have allowed people to judge it on its merits. The Government has not done that. It knows its package is doing nothing for families that are already stretched to breaking point. We ask the Government to adopt our motion and implement the clear measures that we have set out here - targeted measures that will support struggling families in a cost-of-living crisis. Stop wasting time and money that people simply do not have to spare.

Sentiment score: 0.00