PARTY REACTIONS: TAXES IMPOSED in the Budget fell hardest on those who were most in a position to pay, the Green Party said yesterday as it defended the Government measures.
Party leader John Gormley and fellow Green Minister Éamon Ryan both defended the party’s support for all the measures included in the emergency Budget and maintained that the party had exerted a strong influence in several key areas.
The Government spokesman for the Greens said the party had strongly argued since January for cuts in the number of junior ministers, as well as the ending of a practice whereby former ministers who were still sitting TDs and Senators were paid ministerial pensions. All these changes were effected in the Budget, he said.
Éamon Ryan said his party had “worked very hard to ensure that there were no cuts in social welfare rates”.
He also said that the party had ensured that cuts in the Overseas Development Aid budget were confined to €100 million and that Ireland remained the sixth biggest contributor pro rata.
The party’s support for the Budget was strongly attacked in the Dáil yesterday. Labour’s justice spokesman Pat Rabbitte claimed that it was a party that did not stand for anything and therefore stood for nothing.
“For too long, the party has been flying beneath the radar. It is so preoccupied with saving the planet and other loftier issues that it has nothing to do with the state of the economy,” Mr Rabbitte added. “We will see what it does but its performance until now has been lamentable.”
John Gormley responded that Labour in government had increased the number of junior Ministers from 15 to 17 with Mr Rabbitte himself taking up a newly created “super-junior” Minister role especially created for him.
The two Independent TDs who have arrangements with Fianna Fáil to support the Coalition disclosed that they held separate meetings with the Taoiseach to discuss constituency needs.
Michael Lowry accepted that the Budget was punitive and exceptionally harsh. “It puts enormous pressure on middle-class Ireland. There is obviously going to be a huge negative reaction when the impact of the reductions is felt in people’s pay packets.”
However, Mr Lowry (Tipperary North) said the Budget was inevitable and unavoidable. “This is the political reality irrespective of who is in government. Any other government would have given the same medicine out of a different bottle.”
Jackie Healy-Rae (Kerry South), said that the impact of the Budget would cost him a total of €35,000 as his committee chair salary was being halved and because of the loss of his long-service increment.
Asked about his support for the Government, he said: “I had to do it although it hit me worse than any man in the House.” He said the Budget would not please people but said that everybody was expected to give.
Finian McGrath (Dublin North Central) voted against all the financial resolutions. He said he was still angry with the Government over its U-turn on cystic fibrosis facilities and believed that the Budget targeted PAYE workers and not the “bankers and speculators” who were partly responsible for the crisis.
Elsewhere, Fianna Fáil TD Ned O’Keeffe strongly questioned the creation of the National Asset Management Agency as a solution to the banking crisis at the Fianna Fáil parliamentary party meeting on Tuesday night.
Mr O’Keeffe also strongly criticised the influence of economists on Government.
He said that the party could call in 50 economists and each would offer a different solution to the impasse.