TAX reform and tax reduction remain on the back burner despite the Budget concessions, the Fianna Fail leader, Mr Bertie Ahern, said on the second day of a two day debate on the Finance Bill. The Bill, which gives effect to the changes in the Budget was dull and pedestrian", "unimaginative and uninspiring, and a disappointing non event", Mr Ahern said in the Dail.

"Between 1989 and 1992, Fianna Fail Ministers for Finance both on their own and with the PDs cut the standard rate of income tax from 35 per cent to 27 per cent, and the top rate from 58 to 48 per cent, while also cutting VAT from 25 per cent to 21 per cent," he said. "There is simply no comparison with the present Government, who are no friends of the PAYE taxpayer."

He also criticised the Government on job creation. "Coalition ministers boast about 1,000 jobs a month since they came into office. But jobs were being created at that rate in 1994," he said. "What decisions have this Coalition taken of any consequence that have affected or speeded up the flow of inward investment since they came to office? The answer is that they have done nothing. All the structures were put in place by their predecessors."

Mr Ahern welcomed some "minor useful measures" in the Bill, especially the tax exemption on payments to employees under company restructuring schemes. He also welcomed the measures designed to secure the continued successful operation of the International Financial Services Centre. None the less, the Bill lacked vision "to encourage a more thriving small business sector". The economy would "literally stand or fall by the dynamism of the business sector".

He noted that in 1986 corporation tax raised was £258 million or 6 per cent of tax revenue. This year it would be almost £1.5 billion or 11 per cent of revenue. Fianna Fail would claim credit for much of that transformation, he said. "If the present Government had stuck to the disciplines they laid out in the Programme for Renewal, they would have £500 million in hand, both to cut the tax burden and to move towards the goal of eliminating Government borrowing. Instead, this Government proposes to borrow another £2 billion between now and 1999," he said.