Mattie McGrath: Calls budget a 'charade', says farmers 'will be extinct'

Good morning, I too am pleased to be able to reply to some of the delightful speeches today from the Taoiseach, Tanaiste and Northern Minister Ryan, the tripartite, they make up this government and their wonderful budget, playing mind games with the people, because everyone knows that the last three years, or two years, this government and the previous government are not serving the people anymore, they're serving some other global masters, but it's not in the interest of the people here, and come to the charade, I think this is my W Lowry said a while ago he's here for 40 budgets, I'm here for 15 or 16, missed last year, I was sick, but you know, it's a charade now, it's all out in the media, the whole, and in the press conference this morning, I don't know what do you want them for, to see if the people, how they react to the crumbs that they've got from the mighty table of the triumvirate, the GR, I did welcome some issues yesterday, I do welcome the vacuum defibrillators and other health products like that, and issues like that, I welcome the the bonuses, but it's the people's taxpayers' money that you're regurgitating and recycling and giving them back crumbs, as I said. What has happened to our agricultural industry, our primary industry in this country, that served us well from the foundation of our state, when TK Whittaker and others decided to be visionaries and develop our agricultural industry. I mean, it's just a beggar's belief that we're now second from the bottom, the agricultural industry sector, in the funding in this budget, the only lower one is the Taoiseach's budget, he doesn't need the budget because, you know, he doesn't do anything as such as only for PR and forever, media stuff, and God knows what. Agriculture was used to that, and the Greens, I said, are happy with that, and the transport, again, is cut, but as I said, agriculture, a primary industry, that dragged us by the heels out of the last two recessions, and now we're in a deepening, deepening crisis, and people, especially small beef, and indeed, small sheep farmers, and hill farmers, will be extinct. They'll be run off the land, like Cromwell did all those years ago. As I said, they cannot survive any care of their living that they're there, so that is unbelievable. Look, health, is there any point you've talked about? A black monstrosity. Look at a children's hospital, a monumental disaster, and now you'll have a 10% increase in the concrete that's going to the rest of it. This won't stop at 3 billion, and it'll never be, you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, wrong place, wrong location, not accessible, and by the time they get to fit the equipment, it'll be well out of date, because, as we know, there's a lifespan and all that equipment. It's an awful charade. Broadband is the same, another charade, and any other project that you're doing, you just can't, the incompetence is frightening, as I said. Minister, the Greens' footprints, our fingerprints, are all over this boat, because their footprints are standing down on the agriculture, just to diminish it, and their fingerprints are all over it, mentioned umpteen places. I'm surprised that the transit budget was cut under minister Ryan, who's the third member of this government that's leading this country, and he allowed that to happen in his own department. So, to get his vanity projects, and to get it to cripple agriculture, and the carbon tax, and everything else, he lost out, what he should be watching, for major infrastructure projects, and that's happened. The carbon tax criminal, in this, that you could, trickle the loop down the convention centre, passed it, that we had an incremental increase for 10 years, without even voting here, and you had the audacity to put that on this year, on half-pressed taxpayers, on half-pressed people, that have to travel to work, and have to, have to, uh, put fuel in every machine, when the generators are buying now, to keep the lights on, they'd have to put fuel in as well, and as costed. The, the farm contractors didn't, didn't even get a mention, but the carbon tax is punitive, and, uh, and we have parties here now, uh, voting against the increase, when they voted for the 10-year solution, that we would have, uh, an incremental increase every year, it's, it's, it's, it's, uh, fascicle, really. As I said, the tourism sector, our hotels, the blow you've given those, the sector that was so badly affected, as a, um, um, a huge, um, part of our, like, when I'm talking about hotels in Dublin, and I did hear someone today suggest that we should have different tax for Dublin, rate, like they have in, like they have in, in, in, in, uh, New York. Yes, the extortionate prices being charged here, they must be cut back, but I'm talking about the decent hoteliers, all over Tipperary, from Calgary and Shure, up to Clonmel, to Cair, uh, Cairn House Hotel, up to Cashel, right up to North Tipperary, Ross Grey, Temple Moor, and you name it, Nina. Wonderful, hard-working, dedicated entrepreneurs, employ many people. And the, the, the, the, the way they were unceremoniously closed during COVID, and, uh, we saw the bigger supermarkets on, because they opened, but they were all punished. And now to take, to give them that message now, that, and the end of February, coming, uh, that you're going to raise the Vatican, and when there's so many tens of thousands of people employed, and indeed a 10 million industry. And it's so vital, especially in agriculture and rural Ireland, the tourism industry, people have turned to that in a desperate, uh, effort, uh, to make their places better and more receptive, but also to put a bread and butter on the table. And, and what have you done to them? Kicking the tease. The agriculture, the, the, the, the, the, the, the housing, we know, the housing thresholds in, uh, Tipperary haven't been reviewed for over, uh, a decade, 11 years, actually. Minister Urbain stood there where you are sitting now, Minister, or Minister, and told us in November they were under review. No, a couple of counties were reviewed, Tipperary wasn't. The, the, the, the, the, the, the anguish and the punishment that that's putting on ordinary families, working families, working families, people you came to represent, because they're over the thresholds, are so ridiculously low. They're over the thresholds for HAP and over the thresholds, and then they're, they're, they're, they're over the thresholds of wealth to get a council, to get a loan, and they can't get a loan from the council. Uh, that is also terrible. You all have to put on the 10%, as I said, tax on, 10% on concrete. It will affect every house, home, people trying to build houses, and for themselves, builders, uh, road making, you name it, anything else that ever goes on. But most major projects are stopping anyway, because there's no confidence now in this government you don't know what way you're going, or what way things are, are turning out. So, as I said, the home buyers then as well, the assist, uh, for people, the first-time buyers, they're not allowed to buy a second-hand house, or an old house that needs to be done up, or repaired. Where, where is the sense in that? And, Minister, I also want to say, look, that, um, I hope, and I know what happened, and should happen, the biggest vacant property, the vacant property tax, the biggest vacant property owner are the county councils around the country, as they're the biggest polluters, you know, and our water courses as well. But in this case, the vacant properties, will they be made paid a vacant property tax? No, but they should be. And some have since given them to not have this carry-on of houses being left, being left, being left idle, and being left like that. So, um, that is a, a huge anomalies. So, it's all medicine for the little people, and let the public service expand, and expand, and expand, and be not accountable, and have so many properties that are under election, with people trying to do up all those places. I honestly believe, and I believe this, that, um, you just have lost touch, you're a tired lack of energy and spirit to carry on your government. But in, in, in, in sending out that lethargic message to the public here, the creation of this fund yesterday, slipped it in, totally unorthodox what she did, unprecedented, that she put in the, the rainy day fund, and I'm not, I'm totally opposed to it, but I'm opposed to putting in two billion this year, and two, four billion next year, when we should be putting into projects to help our rural communities that we don't get a bob. You have plenty of it here for the Lewis and the Dats and all that up here in, in, in, in the capital. So, as I said, Minister, um, you, it just, it's literally pathetic. You have press conferences in today to explain what you gave. Give them one hand, but you are already taking it away. As I said last night, St. Peter and St. Paul are saints, but, um, I don't know where the saints are with G, because the island of saints and scholars is totally, totally, you have destroyed the spirit of the people. You've taken away, uh, put on these punitive taxes. You've given out, um, credits now. Instead of tackling the big power companies, the wind energy companies, and have the windfall tax on those people as well. You have toolboxes from the, from the EU which you won't use. You've refused to use them. In many areas, you've refused, you've refused to apply for funding, and you didn't apply for, for different schemes in the EU. Other countries have shown the way. Portugal have done it, um, many other countries have done it. Just reduced the VAT to 5%, 6%, and 7%, and you're putting it up here, the exact opposite. Minister, the embarrassing charades of the past three, three years, have shamelessly, um, siphoned, um, went into one direction, towards the globalists, and their, um, their servants, and drained the men and women of Ireland, and I really mean that, and the children of Ireland, and for the future. And we have such a huge diaspora, with an enormous, um, globally influential diaspora, we are the country, that could put a stop to this, uh, story, if your government here, will serve the people, encourage the people, and, and indeed, let them live, let them live, let them work, and let them live, and let them be healthy, and be happy. And, we should do that, because it's embarrassing to see, that we are here now, with this insatiable, uh, um, pretty, uh, drastic, um, um, several, just, desire to serve the globalist masters, and not serve the public, which our constitution dictates, and which the men who were celebrating 100 years ago, fought for this country. But you want to serve the global masters, it's how high, they say jump, and you say how high. We saw it during the, the, the, the, the lockdown, the big conglomerates made a fortune, all small businesses with a stride, but you're wiping small business off the face of the earth. We don't support it all for them, but there is some support for the bigger companies with ESB, and you, you won't have it for the small businesses, the people on the road, the holidays, all those people, they, so badly needed. So, I hand over to my colleagues. Thank you.