Mary Lou McDonald: Demand Emergency Budget Now

The urgent need for an emergency budget grows by the day. In the last week we have had report after report all saying the same thing, that this crisis is getting worse. And this morning we hear that rising prices hit the average household by close to 2,000 euros a year. Families under huge pressure to keep up with the cost of groceries, fuel, insurance, energy bills. 2,000 euros is a lot of money for those working families Taoiseach. For many it's the difference between staying afloat or going under. So the big question that everyone is asking is this. What are you waiting for? How bad do things have to get before you wake up and act? What happened on Friday last should be a loud wake-up call for your government. Pre-pay power, Ireland's largest pay-as-you-go energy provider, announced sharp hikes in their electricity and gas prices. So nearly a quarter of a million customers will now see their average yearly bill shoot up by almost 300 euros. And that's only the start. More increases are on the way. We already have the highest electricity prices in Europe confirmed by Eurostat today. We pay 480 euros a year more compared to the EU average. Other suppliers will hike their prices in coming weeks and why wouldn't they? The big energy companies have nothing to fear from your government. You haven't laid a glove on them. You've taken no action to get prices down. And your gutless carte blanche approach, your refusal to rein in these companies, has left us with the highest electricity bills in Europe. Bills that are landing now, that have pushed more than 300,000 households into arrears. So people are sick of you standing back as they take hit after hit. You won't take on the energy companies to get the prices down. You won't provide energy credits to help households with bills. And you push back against the immediate need for an emergency budget. We have a do-nothing government led by a do-nothing Taoiseach. And as prices go through the roof, you leave people in desperate situations. Stress, worry, cutting back, going without, working hard but still struggling for the basics. And you have the resources to act. The surplus provides room to help. But your message to the working people of Ireland is struggle on, make do, wait for next year's budget as the bills pile up. This isn't just a bad political choice Taoiseach, this is in fact a dereliction of your duty to the people who keep this country going. There is a lot of money on the electricity bills coming out of nowhere, but there is still a lot of work to be done to keep the prices up and running. There is still a long way to go and a lot of work to be done to keep the prices up and running. Taoiseach, the time for lame excuses is over and the time for action is now. An emergency budget isn't just another call from Sinn Féin. It is essential to help prevent households from going to the wall. Energy credits are vital to help families cope with runaway electricity prices. So Taoiseach, it boils down to this. You can either deliver an emergency budget, provide the energy credits, give households the lifeline they desperately need, or you can stand back and continue to do nothing. There is a lot of work to be done to help prevent this from happening again in the future. It follows the tariff issue, which follows the Ukraine situation, the invasion in Ukraine and the post-COVID inflationary cycle that occurred then, which was at 10% then. But one of the challenges here, Deputy, is how to respond properly, sensitively, target in a targeted way that also maintains economic balance and proportion. What I mean by that is, if we were to take the Sinn Féin budgetary package that you put forward at the last budget, and if you were to add the $3 billion and more, we would be looking at inflation rates of about 5% or 6% in our economy. And that's the reality of it. So you've got to be careful. You can keep spending more and more money every month, but it will have an inflationary impact, and we'll be chasing inflation. And that won't alleviate pressures on working families, because when inflation gets higher, it's the lowest income groups who will suffer the most. And so we have to be extremely targeted in how we do things, both sectorally and in terms of low-income groups. And remember, we've reduced that already in terms of electricity charges down to 9%, and we're going to maintain that out to 2030. But that just gets ignored when you list everything that you have listed. So we've just announced the $755 million to $717 million package recently to alleviate the pressures on the public, and indeed on crucial sectors around food production and around haulage, and many, many thousands and thousands of workers working in those sectors. But also, as we were doing that, we've increased expenditure on education by $646 million, additional to the budget. So we have choices here. You can't have it each way and every way. And we're keeping a focus on those services, because if you keep spending billions now, you won't have the money for education, special education, childcare reductions, health services. You won't have the funding for all of that at the next budget, or indeed for next year. And what we have done so far, we have extended the fuel allowance, we increased it, and we expanded it in terms of the number of people it covers, particularly those on the working family payments. And we've increased the minimum wages, increased significantly. We've deferred carbon tax increases, and as I said, we have a variety of packages for a range of sectors. Our social welfare payments went up 10 euros in the last budget. It's come under huge pressure since then. I acknowledge that. But we also put in record increases to child income support payments, the highest on record. And that was a really significant targeted message. But the way you want it, really, is you want not to do that. You really want us to move away from that sort of targeting approach. And then we have, in the context of the October budget, we will have available to us other mechanisms, like tax and other measures that we can introduce that can benefit people, to get people over the winter period, which is going to be a crucial period for all. You acknowledge on the one hand, Gwildiini is tsaoli fwibhru, that people are under pressure. You acknowledge the stress that people are living with day and daily. I'm sure you accept the figures and the facts presented to you of over 300,000 households in arrears. The fact that energy prices, gas and electricity have risen again. The fact that people here spend more than anyone else right across Europe already on their electricity costs. You acknowledge all of that. But then when the obvious question is made of you, what will you do to respond now? Not next October, not next January, now, in May. Now, as these bills are landing. Now, as families are under this level of pressure. You come up blank. And all you offer is spoof and distraction. Well, nobody's going to buy that Taoiseach, because people have to live with the realities of the here and now. When will you intervene? You really are a do-nothing... Taoiseach, to respond, please. Deputy, your time is up. Taoiseach will respond. Taoiseach will respond. Deputy. Taoiseach, your time is up. Please comply. No disrespect, Deputy, to you and your party, but you are the personification of spoof and bluster. Absolutely. If we had introduced the measures that you advocated from last October, we would be looking at inflation rates of close to 5%. And that's by any yardstick or by any formula. That is the reality. And we have already acted. And you know that. 750 million is not spoof. It's real funding that we've budgeted for and we've allocated. In terms of the food production sector, in terms of farmers, in terms of contractors, and in terms of the haulage industry. And we have hundreds of thousands of people working in all of those sectors. That's not spoof. It might be spoof to you. Because you're a Johnny-come-lately when it comes to the farming world. But it's not spoof to the people who are benefiting it. From that kind of thing. Please. Please. In terms of the people who are going to benefit from it. And I would say this, Deputy. Deputy, please. I would say this, Deputy. Yeah, exactly. You don't want to listen to anybody because you're incapable of listening to the truth. And the bottom line is, you're the coach all along at this energy. Deputy Ivana Bacik. Thank you, Deputy Bacik. It's on her feet.