TDs better off after budget, says Halligan

TDs have done well out of the budget and are better off than the people in poverty who elected them, the Dáil has heard.

Independent TD John Halligan said it was reprehensible that deputies were better off because of this budget "than those hundreds of thousands of people in poverty who elected us".

He highlighted the case of a worker on a €70,000 salary being €746 better off while a low-paid worker “struggling to makes ends meet on €15,000 a year will have just €115 more in their pockets”.

The Waterford TD said: “The fact that we have done well out of this budget does not sit comfortably with many members. I believe it is reprehensible.”

Speaking during the ongoing budget debate Mr Halligan also expressed his horror at the 11 per cent universal social charge imposed on the self-employed earning over €100,000 compared to 8 per cent for public sector employees on the same salary. “If someone takes a chance, goes out on their own and probably creates jobs, to have them paying over more tax is ridiculous.”

Mr Halligan pointed out that when the social charge was introduced it was called an emergency measure because of the economic crisis. The Government was now saying the crisis was over and he asked why this “so-called temporary measure” had not been abolished.

Socialist Party TD Joe Higgins said many developers in Nama, who played a major part in the crash, were getting €200,000 a year but women and children were only getting an extra €5 a month in child benefit.

Mr Higgins said austerity was not finished but “embedded in every pore of the public services”. Highlighting the opposition to water charges he asked what the Government would do “when it is faced with hundreds of thousands of householders who correctly see the injustice and refuse to pay”.

He asked would the Government flood communities with gardaí. “Will it bring thousands of people to the courts for simple contract debts? Will the Government set up special water courts because it cannot deal with the level of opposition?”

Independent TD Stephen Donnelly described the budget as "politically cute and economically foolish". He said the tax changes and the water charges "do not change the total tax but move the burden from higher-income households to lower-income households".

The Wicklow deputy said that adjusting for the State’s young population, “in Ireland we have the second-highest healthcare spend per capita on earth”, after the US.

It was however badly overrun and the answer for next year was “not to make it run better but to give it more money.”

Mr Donnelly said the biggest winners were landowners and high earners.