MANIFESTO:FINE GAEL'S election manifesto has promised that the party, if elected to government, will create 100,000 jobs, reduce the public sector by 30,000, and renegotiate the IMF-EU rescue package.
Party leader Enda Kenny launched the 80-page document at the Royal College of Physicians in Dublin yesterday.
The manifesto described Fine Gael’s five-point plan for economic recovery and its specific policies in 21 sectors from agriculture to transport. The five-point plan has identified growth and jobs, deficit reduction, smaller government, political reform and universal health insurance as the key areas to allow Ireland recover from its current crisis.
In the chapter on banking and debt distress, the document has promised that a Fine Gael government will make the system an engine of economic recovery.
Its first priority, it has stated, is to renegotiate the EU-IMF programme. The party said that forcing Ireland to borrow up to €25 billion in additional funds from the EU and IMF at an interest rate of 5.8 per cent would “push Irish government debt towards unsustainable levels and hinder economic recovery, threatening the stability of the entire euro area”.
The party’s finance spokesman, Michael Noonan, told the news conference: “Unless the bailout package is made more affordable, there is a high risk, without anybody taking a policy decision, banks will run into default positions.”
Fine Gael will undertake to renegotiate a “more credible and fairer package” if given a mandate.
There are no new policy initiatives contained in the document, with the possible exception of a formal confirmation that the party will reverse the ban on stag hunting if elected to government.
Mr Kenny said yesterday that the section on the Irish language contained new elements, namely his and the party’s commitment to the language.
However, the chapter – written in Irish – is a word-for-word reproduction of the Irish language policy unveiled earlier this month.
Irish-language activists have objected to the party formally adopting a position in which Irish would no longer be compulsory for the Leaving Certificate.
The manifesto contains summaries of major Fine Gael policy papers. The New Era policy has committed the party to investing €7 billion in infrastructure, funded by the National Pension Reserve Fund and also from the sell-off of some State assets.
Its FairCare proposal on health is described in the manifesto as the “most ambitious plan for health reform since the establishment of the State”. The policy is directed at dismantling the HSE and replacing it with a system of universal health insurance, starting in 2016. The party will also seek 8,000 redundancies in this sector. Under the system, all citizens will have private health insurance though public hospitals will remain in public ownership, albeit run on a trust system.
The party also restated its commitment to abolish the Seanad and reduce the number of TDs by 20.
Under the tax heading, the party commits to retaining corporation tax at 12.5 per cent and not increasing income taxes or employers’ PRSI.
VAT will be lowered by 1 per cent at the lower rate and increased by 1 per cent at the higher rate.
The document also commits to abolishing over 145 State agencies and quangos, implementing the McCarthy report recommendations in full, and reducing the numbers employed in the public sector by 30,000 (18,000 by voluntary redundancy, the balance by non-replacement of retirees).
The document also indicates that local authorities will have more control over their funding (including the eventual right to charge residents for essential services). The document also states that water utilities will have to be run on a commercial and self-financing basis, a signal that such companies will charge consumers for the use of water. Mr Noonan confirmed as much yesterday.
FINE GAEL MANIFESTO: MAIN POINTS
Renegotiate the EU-IMF deal
Invest €7 billion in New Era infrastructure plan and create 100,000 jobs
Begin dismantling HSE from 2016 in favour of model of universal health insurance
Abolish Seanad and reduce number of TDs by 20 to 146.
No new income taxes; no change to corporation tax
Possible new indirect charges for water and local services
Reduce number of personnel in public sector by 30,000
Achieve 10 per cent savings in public sector
Reverse ban on stag hunting
End compulsory Irish in Leaving Certificate cycle