Budget 2024, by a renter, a landlord, a teacher and more: ‘We are the squeezed middle’

The renter

Lisa Monaghan was renting a house with her two sons and husband for six years when the landlord decided to sell last year.

The decision rendered them homeless, with Ms Monaghan and one of her children having to move in with her parents while her husband and other son moved in with his parents.

The family was separated for six weeks before they finally found another place to live. However, they were only able to afford the property due to their eligibility for the homeless Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) scheme, which gives more supports to tenants than the regular HAP.

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The rent for her current accommodation comes in at €2,200 a month, €1,500 of which is paid through HAP.

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“In our previous house we were paying €1,300, and even that was difficult. Dave’s wages come in at about €2,800 per month. So there is no way we could live in this house without HAP. We’re doing very well considering,” she said.

But there are still pressures on the family’s finances. Ms Monaghan is calling for other supports to help with the cost of living crisis in particular.

“We are the squeezed middle. We don’t qualify for any of the other supports. I have a child going into secondary school next year so we’re really going to feel that. I have a communion and a Confirmation next year too,” she said.

“We only just about have the car on the road. A day-to-day basic [necessity] is essentially a luxury for us.”

Ms Monaghan said the family lives their life without any “luxuries” and the vast proportion of their income is required to cover the overall cost of living.

“We have no family holidays. I would love to bring the boys even for a night or two to a hotel as a holiday, but you could be talking €700 for that, so that’s just not something we could afford,” she said.

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It would be beneficial if there were more support available to those who are not directly on the poverty line but who still struggle with the day-to-day expenses of living, or who will indefinitely be a tenant, she said.

The pensioner

Eileen McCann (83) lives alone in Ballinteer, Dublin. A widow, she is entitled to €264 a week – higher-rate old-age pension for those aged 80 and over, plus the living alone allowance of €22 a week. Through winter she will get the fuel allowance, worth €924 in total which she chooses to get in two lump-sums. “It means you have some savings there if there’s a big expense,” she said.

Her priorities coming into the winter are heating her home and her health insurance, She would like support with these in Budget 2024.

She is prone to blackouts and falls due to fluctuations in blood pressure. She just spent several weeks in hospital after one fall.

“The doctors are afraid I could blackout in a part of the house that’s freezing if the heating is not on,” she said.

Last winter, with some help from the Alone charity for older people, she was able to keep her heating on low to keep the worst cold at bay.

“Hopefully I will be able to pay the heating if I heat just my bedroom and the bathroom at night-time. I’ve got timers on in the kitchen and hall. The blood pressure drops rapidly at night and I go bang [fall]. The doctors in St Vincent’s hospital say I need go to bed by 6 or 7pm before ‘falling time’,” she said.

“The other worry is health insurance. I took out VHI when my spine was damaged when I was in my 20s. I find it is the only way, if you need any kind of treatment or surgery. Otherwise you would be waiting years and years. I’d sooner live on sandwiches than lose my VHI. It comes out at €253 a month.”

Other expenses include her TV package, mobile phone, house insurance, bin charges and pharmacy charges. “I pay about €10 or €12 a month at the pharmacy but if there is something I need that’s not on the medical card I could end up paying €30. That’s a huge amount.”

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Asked about reports of a possible €12 increase in pension payments in the Budget, she is not impressed. “The price of everything is going up sky high ...that €12 is gone very quick.”

“They will have to sort out the cost of electricity and the heating, especially the heating. And a better healthcare system so you don’t have to sit two or three days in A&E.”

The teacher

On weekday mornings teacher Aideen Clarke gets into her car just after 6am for the hour’s journey from Portlaoise to her school in Stepaside in South Dublin.

As oil prices rise, she has seen the cost of diesel for her 1.6 litre Ford Focus climb to about €120 per week.

“It all adds up and eats into whatever available income I have,” said Ms Clarke (45), an economics and business teacher.

She moved to Portlaoise a few years ago, after being priced out of the Greater Dublin Area. She rents a house for €1,125 a month.

“It is a large sacrifice in terms of quality of life, having to get up at 5am ... even at that, rent accounts for just under 50 per cent of my take-home pay,” she said.

As budget day looms, she is hoping for a restoration of excise duty cuts which are due to expire at the end of this month. The cuts, introduced in 2022, amounted to 21c being taken off the cost of a litre of petrol and 16c off a litre of diesel. The phased restoration of the tax started last June and a final hike is due on October 31st.

“If they press ahead with that, prices will climb above €2 a litre. I can just about afford it as things are – and I’m earning just under fifty grand,’” she said.

She is opposed to a giveaway budget which she worries would simply fuel inflation. Instead, she supports more targeted measures – like reduced excise duty – for people and families struggling with day-to-day living costs.

“I teach my students about all of this. We need a measured, sensible approach that balances what the Government needs ... If we get a short-term, throwaway budget, it risks overheating the economy and we end up getting more austerity,” she said.

After years of jobs in marketing, finance, credit control, Ms Clarke went back to college in her mid-30s to pursue her dream of teaching.

With almost five years under her belt at second level, she estimates her take-home pay – based on a pretax income of €48,000 – is about €34,000.

A member of the Teachers’ Union of Ireland, she is trying to save up for a mortgage. She works in the hospitality industry on weekends and is planning to rent out a room in her house to supplement her income.

“For me, it’s a case of getting to the next pay cheque. I don’t live an extravagant lifestyle. I don’t buy coffees or go out for lunch. I eat out of my freezer most of the time.”

The landlord

Maurice Deverell has been a landlord for 27 years, renting out properties in Dublin and in the United Kingdom.

Mr Deverell said there are “very tight” margins, meaning it is a difficult business to be in.

“It is just not financially viable any more. Then there is a two-tier system of rent. There are rising costs and a lot of landlords are leaving the market,” he said.

“All costs have gone up, but we’re not allowed to increase our rents because of the RPZs (rent pressure zones).”

Mr Deverell said there are ways to entice landlords to stay in the market through the upcoming budget, adding that the last two years have not offered any assistance to landlords.

“If you lower the tax that landlords pay to a reasonable level that would help. We thought about it and figure that 25 per cent is fair, and we based it on the fact a REIT (real estate investment trust) doesn’t generally pay any tax and we’re paying 52 per cent,” he said.

“That’s why we would like to see a serious thing done on the income tax.”

Change to the rules around capital gains tax could also prove beneficial in maintaining the number of people working in the rental market, he said. “If you keep properties in the market for the next seven years then you don’t pay capital gains tax,” he said.

“That is a really good way of encouraging landlords to stay for seven years and within seven years you would hope the Government would have built enough social housing and we wouldn’t be in the mess we’re in.”

Mr Deverell said there is a “lot of anger out there” among landlords at the current situation. “I haven’t seen before so many selling up and getting out,” he said. “It’s really just not financially viable.”

The unemployed person

Gavin Bushe (44) lives in Jobstown, Dublin. He has been out of work for almost two years. He was working as a childcare assistant but had to give that up due a significant mental health diagnosis.

“It’s a great job and great fun but I felt I wasn’t doing the children justice because of my mental health difficulty. It gives me a very low level of energy, and I am subject to fatigue.”

In Budget 2024 he would like to see the energy credits repeated, price-controls on essentials like milk and bread, an end to bin-charges and greater supports for people with mild disabilities accessing work.

He gets €220 a week disability allowance, €22 a week living alone allowanceand the fuel allowance, worth €33 a week from 25th September to 5th April. He lives in social housing so his rent is low.

“I am having to rely on supports from my parents with things like food and so on. It’s quite a basic life l am living. My big concern at the moment is recycling. Like everyone, I am with a private bin company which charges an annual service fee which is very expensive. I don’t know how I am going to pay that, for example. So I am quite annoyed the Government privatised the service.

“I have to keep the heating down to a minimum. When it gets cold I just put on an extra layer of clothing. It is unfortunate I have do that. The energy credits last year definitely helped and I hope they are repeated.

“I would like the Government to introduce price controls for household necessities. If the Government could earmark a basket of basics like bread and milk, they should be in my opinion price controlled.”

He is “quite happy” with what he gets in social welfare, adding: “I am not asking for more than I need.

“Really, what I would like is more help returning to work for people on disability allowance.” He would like the income disregard increased from the current €165 a week, so people could earn more without their allowance being cut.

“I have found the jobs market hard to negotiate. There are very few part-time jobs on offer and with my mental health it would be a fool’s gambit to try and go straight back to full time work. It affects my mental health not being able to work.”

The business owner

Small business owner Deirdre Mahon, who runs her boutique Quack and Dirk in Fairview, said she would like to see funding in Budget 2024 to help smooth out trade with UK suppliers post-Brexit, as well as tax breaks to help support the growth of small suppliers at home.

“I’ve been struggling a little bit with my suppliers in the UK with Brexit. There are extra costs and with it coming into the country that I have to pay, I had a box two weeks ago get stuck for 10 days, I had to get extra paperwork and it was such a hassle. That is stressful as a small business, I feel it’s still so glitchy, I know we’re new to it still, but its not running as smooth as it could run,” she said.

“And maybe there could be a lower tax rate for smaller makers. Some might not have the quantities to be buying wholesale, so it is harder for them to get in at a price that I can buy it at and then put a markup to sell to my customers,” she added.

Ms Mahon also said she would like to see more green supports, such as a lowering of VAT for more environmentally friendly products.

“If there was some sort of help there to encourage businesses in the fashion trade to be a bit greener, that would be a huge help for small business like me that are really interested in the environment. I want to help but sometimes, with higher prices, it’s harder. If there was a tax break or some kind of help with VAT on green products, I could get them in at more attainable price for my customer, and encourage the whole circle to keep going round,” she said.

The carer

Tracy Carroll lives near Navan, Co Meath with her husband John, her son Noah (9), who has ADHD and daughter Willow (6) who has spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy and epilepsy.

In addition to being a carer for her two young children she has advocated for parents who find themselves in circumstances where they struggle to cope with the financial and other challenges presented by balancing caring, work and other responsibilities.

“I don’t actually like to call myself a carer,” she said. “I just want to be a mother to my children and for them to be allowed just to be kids but we don’t have the resources for that so it’s 24/7 because with Willow if I don’t give her that support with every single aspect of her life, she won’t live.

“I thought Covid might be a bit of a turning point for carers in that so many people feeling that challenge – the isolation, the depression, the sense of struggle on a daily basis – and I hoped something positive might come out of that but I was disappointed by last year’s Budget. I am hopeful again this time, though.

“What I’d like to see is a shift in the way people in need of care are viewed so that their needs become the focus rather than the means of the wider household. The person being cared for needs to be looked at as an individual and in Willow’s case she is a very complex child.

“Her clothes are specialised, her shoes are specialised, we have to have a specialised vehicle and there is a lot of additional expense heating the home because of the cost of electricity. There should be more support in areas like that because they are supports to the child.

“Also, with waiting lists so long I’d like to see parents able to claim back the costs of assessments or therapies obtained privately. We’re spending €400 to €600 a month on private therapy sessions for Noah and that’s a pressure on the household because we can’t access it publicly and that’s an issue putting serious pressure on a lot of families.

“I’d also like to see the budget for in-school supports for children like Willow taken from the HSE and given to the Department of Education because at the moment I don’t believe the system is working and I think the people running schools would be better equipped to make it work. Willow started school in January and the school has been so welcoming. But I have to stay with her every day because there is no nurse.

“And it would be nice to see the allowance for carers increased. Our artists are getting €325 a week now, I’m delighted for them but it’s €100 more than most carers who maybe deserve the same respect.”

The childcare provider

Louise Kilbane runs three Lollipop Lane day care and early learning centres in Tubbercurry, Co Sligo and Kiltimagh, Co Mayo. She has been involved in the sector for 20 years and lectures in Early Childhood Education and Care at ATU Mayo.

“We have 350 children on our books and 40 staff across our three settings but like everyone else we have been affected by the staffing crisis and have had to close rooms because we haven’t been able to maintain the staffing levels we would need to keep them open.

“The Government funding of the sector over the past couple of years has represented real progress but I’d like this Budget to provide funding that lays the basis for some longer-term planning and more funding for school aged child care, particularly around staffing and qualifications.

“I suppose a key ask for me is getting comparable providers on similar income levels so that our staff get to the stage where they can receive similar wages. I think that would also help with the staffing crisis.

“A lot of providers, like myself, are working off fees that were set well before the freeze came in, in our case they haven’t changed since 2016. We were set to put them up in 2020 but then didn’t because of Covid so I’d like to see a conversation about that and how we create a more level playing field without impacting negatively on parents and families. Reducing costs to them is key.

“Ultimately, I feel we need to be moving towards a public model but we certainly need one where everyone has access. Children are entitled to a place in primary school and in secondary school. It should be the same where early education is concerned because that’s what it is: education. That is going to require further investment and we will see with this Budget what the level of ongoing Government commitment is.

“But staffing is the most pressing issue, I think. There are still staff in the sector who are living on the poverty line ... graduates, qualified professionals. And the sector loses a lot of staff after they have children because they can’t afford to send their own children to services.

“We need the funding to address levels of pay because progress has been slow so far.”