THE GOVERNMENT will “level” with the people on hard decisions that it will have to take in the upcoming budget, Tánaiste and Labour Party leader Eamon Gilmore said yesterday.
Addressing his colleagues in the parliamentary party in Co Carlow yesterday, Mr Gilmore said: “No government wants to have to cut spending and increase revenue . But it has to be done, for the sake of our country, and for the next generation.
“In making those hard decisions this Government will level with people. We will say, yes, it is going to be difficult, but we are going to get on with it.”
There was no template or “off-the-shelf” formula for a social democratic party to deal with the current economic crisis, Mr Gilmore added.
However, in his address yesterday at the opening of the two-day party “think-in” at Tullow, he emphasised that new solutions would not be found at the expense of old values.
Citing social welfare reform as one aspect of the challenge facing the party, he said this was never easy, but added: “We cannot go on as we are.”
Mr Gilmore also pledged that “where a family is living in a modest home and has run into problems paying their mortgage, then we will take every reasonable measure to keep them in their home”.
He stressed that this would have to be done on a case-by-case basis.
“There will be no blanket upfront debt writedown – that would be neither fair nor feasible.”
Mr Gilmore, who is Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, said: “No incoming government has ever inherited a mess of the type and nature that we did.” The situation was “without precedent”.
“No previous Irish government has faced similar circumstances. The Labour Party hasn’t done so, nor have our sister parties in Europe. We are pioneers in a new place.
“If Ireland is to be the first country to emerge successfully from an IMF programme then the present Irish Government will be the first government in Europe to achieve that, and Labour will be the first social democratic party in Europe with responsibility for achieving that goal.”
Mr Gilmore said: “There is no template for us, as a social democratic party, faced with the enormous challenge of guiding Ireland out of this crisis.
“We have to look, not at what worked in the past, but at what works now. We cannot rely on the old manuals.
“But that does not mean that we jettison our values. Quite the contrary. Now, more than ever, we must look to our values, and find ways to put them into effect. Our values of solidarity, of community, of responsibility, of fairness and of expanding the horizons of all our citizens.
”Social welfare reform is one example of this challenge. We never could, and we certainly cannot now, afford to see a build up of long-term unemployment. Reforming welfare is never easy, but we cannot go on as we are.”
Speaking to reporters earlier, Mr Gilmore said: “I think it is pretty clear that we do have to reduce the overall social welfare budget, there hasn’t been any doubt about that, and the measures that Joan Burton is undertaking will achieve that.”
He rejected a newspaper report that Cabinet colleagues considered him indecisive and insufficiently assertive. “We are not going to be distracted by that kind of tittle-tattle. We have a job of work to do.”
Interviewed on the Pat Kenny show on RTÉ radio yesterday, Minister for Communication Pat Rabbitte said Mr Gilmore was the “most successful leader” the Labour Party had ever had.
