As I said last night, the purpose of the budget is threefold: to reward work, promote enterprise and strengthen society. These are three key Fine Gael principles. Some of the measures taken in the budget have helped to remove the wedge which stopped people working. We advocate an enterprise culture based on reward for investment and success. Many of the measures in the budget which have the aim of introducing a new dynamism in the economy are part of Fine Gael policy.
Last year, Fine Gael argued for a profamily budget believing that directing support towards the family unit was the most effective means of strengthening communities and tackling social problems.Several of the measures clearly demonstrate Fine Gael's commitment to the family.
As far as rewarding work in concerned, changes in income tax and employers PRSI are most important. We have increased the general exemption limits by £100 or £200 depending on whether a person is single or married. We have widened the standard bands to £700 for a single person and £1,400 for a married couple. We increased personal allowances and exempted the first £50 per week from PRSI. This will reduce the cost of employment for firms and give better returns to those at work. We increased the threshold from £9,000 to £12,000, retaining the 9 per cent rate for PRSI and reduced the ceiling for employers contribution from £26,000 to £25,800. We extended the employers PRSI exemption scheme to include those under the age of 23 who are first time workers regardless of their status on the live register. These are major improvements.
Many crocodile tears have been shed by the Opposition because we increased social welfare payments by 2.5 per cent. This increase is being brought forward to the middle of June which makes it equivalent to the 3 per cent given by the previous Government. We have improved the position for carers. When I was first elected to this House two years ago it was generally accepted that the carer's allowance was such in name only. However, I must give credit to the former Minister for Social Welfare who last year excluded the first £100 of a spouse's income in assessing eligibility for that allowance, which figure has been increased by the present Minister to £150. More important, he has also allowed contributory old age pensioners to qualify for the carer's allowance. Also of importance is the £7 extra for all children and the increase in the age limit to 18 years for those young people participating in FÁS courses or in full-time education. Another matter raised many times in this House was the fact that a young person was forced to leave home in order to qualify for any social welfare benefit which meant that the State also had to pay them a rent allowance, increased by the present Minister from £10 to £25. While we should all like to see that figure somewhat higher, this latest increase constitutes an improvement.
The Minister has also increased the fuel allowance, which had remained static for many years, from £5 to £6, which may not appear to be much but, when added to the 2.5 per cent increase, does not deserve condemnation from the far side of the House. There is also being made available a free colour television licence. I am sure most people would have preferred not to see blood shed at Lansdowne Road yesterday which was deplored by all.
The decision to abolish third-level fees over the next two years is to be welcomed, particuarly by the many middle-income families who experienced extreme financial difficulty, having been unable to gain much from covenants while paying full college fees for their children. While those of us in Border regions will benefit from some of our students travelling northwards over the next two years, they will be enabled to choose between North and South colleges.Like other Members, I want to see an improvement in the maintenance grant for third-level students. I welcome the fact that those students who must go abroad because they cannot find suitable courses or whatever here, will be given a maintenance allowance. This is a welcome change because there was an anomaly in the past in that if a student remained at home and did not endeavour to improve himself or herself, he or she was paid a social welfare allowance whereas, if the same student went abroad, he or she did not receive anything.
An extra £8 million has been provided to deal with hospital waiting lists. That should alleviate the problems of many people awaiting heart surgery, hip replacements and so on. It is extremely important that we look after our sick and aged, something to which this Government has shown absolute commitment.
I have been much involved in agriculture over many years and I make no apology for raising that industry as a major issue in this budget. I welcome the commitment of the new Minister, Deputy Yates, and his Minister of State, Deputy Deenihan. Their dynamism and efforts in this Department within the few short weeks must be commended. Before I became involved in party politics I spent a number of years with the Irish Farmers' Association and, through that organisation, I was a member of the meat board. When I was appointed to that board in 1979, State allocation amounted to £700,000 and, in the following spring, the former Minister Mr. McSharry in his budget cut that figure in half. In this year's Estimates, consolidated in the budgetary provisions, there is evidence of the Government's commitment to the food industry in the allocation of £8 million to An Bord Bia, the replacement of CBF, and so on. That is much to be welcomed.
In a further endeavour to encourage farmers and agriculturalists generally to modernise their operations making them competitive, the Minister has increased the allocation to Teagasc by £3 million, allowing the creation of an additional 350 jobs and the entry of young, new blood into that organisation. That is vital to the adoption of innovative ideas. Methods used by many farmers should be followed by others. Indeed, such methods have already been adopted successfully by many industrialists. We must produce the highest quality food. We live on a green island of which we are proud and of which we must make others aware. The £640 million package announced by the Minister in recent days is a further indication of his and the Government's commitment to the food and agri-industry which we hope will produce an additional 5,000 jobs and help existing industries maintain their present employees.
In the past two years we have seen evidence of the severe inadequacies in the Department when called upon to deal with the enormous volume of form-filling as a result of changes in European Union regulations. It would be my hope that the farmers' charter of rights to be drawn up by the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry, and his Minister of State, Deputy Deenihan, accompanied by the budgetary provision of £5 million will be enormously beneficial and welcomed by all farmers. Those of us involved in farming and politics in recent years have been inundated with complaints by farmers who have not received their entitlements on time, or not at all, sometimes for very trivial reasons. For example, in County Monaghan there is one staff member only in the departmental office whereas an equivalent number of herd owners is serviced by a staff of two in Longford; perhaps that had something to do with their local representative at that time.
The Minister's commitment to updating departmental offices, increasing staff levels and having them remain open for realistic hours should be of further help to farmers and ensure that they can have their problems dealt with in their home towns without having to telephone, say, Portlaoise, Castlebar, Dublin or Cavan.
Another welcome development is the Minister's commitment to introduce stock relief for four years for young farmers, who felt they had no possibility ever of increasing their stock numbers because of quotas, over which we had no control, but also because of lack of tax relief, over which we did have control.That relief had been sought by those young farmers, and their organisations, before the announcement in the budget. Another severe impediment to the transfer of farms was the imposition of capital acquisitions tax and the fact that a farmer can now transfer, as a gift, up to £420,000 worth tax free, is a guarantee for young farmers remaining in business.
There is urgent need also for simplified application forms for various grants and I am delighted to see the Minister's commitment in that regard. Many farmers do not have the necessary education to understand how the computerised form system operates. It is important that the forms are simplified and that if farmers encounter problems with forms they can bring them into their local office and have the problem dealt with quickly so that they can receive their grants on time. In January 1994 some farmers sent their forms and blue cards or identity cards to Portlaoise. Those cards were returned stamped and the farmers took it for granted that everything was in order. Some of them sold their cattle in June, July and August of that year. In August, however, they received letters which indicated that because the ages of the cattle were wrongly recorded on the forms they were not eligible for grants. If that matter had been rectified within two months of the application being made those farmers could have reapplied at a later date and received their money. This is important not only for farmers but also because they do not receive grants from the Department, the Department cannot claim such money from the EU. The EU is always being condemned for not giving enough funding but this is a clear case of the State being unable to claim EU funding because farmers could not collect their grants. We must ensure this problem is rectified under the charter of rights.
We would like some of the budgetary provisions improved and I make no apology for saying that. Efforts are being made by farmers to control pollution and aid has been given by the previous Minister and by this Minister, but farmers have had to borrow a good deal of money towards building projects.They are being asked to pay tax on meagre incomes and are only being allowed a small amount of relief for depreciation. I ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry and the Minister for Finance to give a more generous depreciation allowance in the first few years of such projects so that farmers will have an opportunity to meet repayments. While farming may yield reasonable incomes which enable farmers make repayments, one only has to recall the early 1980s when many farmers were caught out and had to pay extraordinarily high levels of interest and did not have the necessary finance to make repayments. That must not happen again.
The allocation of £25 million in the agricultural budget to meet the cost of the beef tribunal is a severe loss to farmers and the economy. I hope we will learn from that experience and not become involved in such a tribunal again. Many projects in Monaghan and across the country could have been funded with the £25 million to £40 million spent on the beef tribunal. It is hoped that new committee structures can be set up in this House to deal with future inquiries. We saw such a structure in operation in December and January.We must not allow taxpayers' money to be spent on such a tribunal again. My constituency colleague last night spoke about roads, water schemes and so on in County Monaghan. One can only imagine how the costs involved in the beef tribunal could have been used to benefit that county. I hope that in future such moneys will be allocated for water schemes and other services.
I wish to refer to the issue of live exports versus the dead meat trade. I welcome the efforts of the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry, Deputy Yates, to resolve this problem between farmers and others who are trying to block live exports. This is a European issue and must be dealt with at European level. I have no doubt that people involved in this campaign are genuinely committed to improving animal welfare, but the activities of some of those involved must be questioned. Having spent many of my earlier years lobbying on behalf of the rights of farmers at national and European level, I support the rights of groups to lobby in an orderly and proper fashion but they should direct their efforts towards the European Parliament and Europe in general where decisions can be made. I understand the Minister and his colleagues, together with the European Commission, are making every effort to ensure that proper guidelines are issued for the movement of cattle and other livestock.
I must remind the House of the importance of competition. During the 1950s and 1960s many people emigrated to the United Kingdom, America and other destinations to find work. My home county of Monaghan was not any different in that respect. When I became involved in farming and took up a position from which I could address this problem, I decided to ensure that, where possible, Irish livestock would be slaughtered at home and that jobs, and consequently people, would be retained. As a result of my efforts and those of many others in Europe in the early 1980s there was a reorganisation of the EU support in favour of the dead meat trade. The meat industry recognised my role in that area by presenting me with the Bastow Memorial Award in 1985 for my commitment to the processing industry. In the years that followed, however, I, like many other farmers, was completely disillusioned with the monopoly in the meat industry. It failed to pass on a realistic return to farmers and the reality is that many more farmers would have gone out of business if it had not been for the reopening of the live trade. When the former Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry, Deputy Walsh, allowed the port of Greenore to be closed on technical grounds I and some other backbenchers made every effort to have it reopened in the interests of trade.
I am committed to the protection of jobs and income for all those involved in the meat industry. In the interests of competition it is important that regulations for the transportation of live animals are agreed at European level. I understand important meetings will take place in Europe in this regard early next week and I wish the Minister and his officials success in those negotiations, not only for the sake of farmers but for the benefit of our economy. That is possibly one of the most important issues the Minister has to deal with in the near future. We all want to ensure that jobs are retained and that the industry is improved.
The Minister has allocated £640 million for improvements in the processing industry. It is important to have balance and realise that live cattle are exported to distant countries. It is in farmers' interests that those cattle are properly cared for because if they do not arrive at their destination in a healthy condition, they will not satisfy the needs of customers.Farmers, the industry and the Minister are committed to ensuring that proper procedures are followed in the export of live animals and I hope this matter can be properly resolved in the not too distant future.
I welcome the fact that there was not any increase on VAT or other taxes in respect of goods sold in Border areas. My colleague, Deputy Leonard, spoke about what happened many years ago. Regardless of what party was responsible, I welcome the changes which have been made in recent years to bring taxes into line so that traders in towns along the Border can earn a reasonable income. An increase of a few pence in the price of petrol and auto diesel might have been acceptable having regard to the position in Monaghan and Cavan if extra money needed to improve county roads was made available. I, like my other colleagues in rural Ireland, realise the seriousness of the condition of country roads. I welcome the Minister's commitment of an additional £8 million in the budget in this regard but more must be done. I will use every opportunity to ensure that more funds are made available to Border regions whether through Exchequer funds, INTERREG or other schemes under the Delors package.
While the people in Cavan-Monaghan have shown their ability to produce chickens and mushrooms and to engage in small industry without Government help they deserve proper roads. I have a letter from Cavan County Council which states that money was allocated for the Benbawn road, the R525 in Cavan — where an aged aunt of mine lives — in last year's budget. The county council understood the road would be repaired but afterwards the local engineers decided it would not unless the local inhabitants provided extra money. This is unfair double taxation.
While the rates were abolished in 1977 this is a new form of rates, a draconian measure, against those living in rural areas. I hope the Minister and others will ensure that while farmers and rural dwellers are prepared to help in every way to clean up watercourses, cut hedges and so on it is unfair to ask them for contributions, up to £800 per household, to have their roads repaired while highways and roundabouts are provided for the people of Dublin and elsewhere. The question of roads is extremely important and I make no apology for bringing the matter to the attention of the Taoiseach, the Tánaiste and all the Ministers concerned. If we are committed to keeping the people in rural areas we must be committed to rebuilding and restructuring roads.
With the few exceptions I mentioned this is a good budget. It helps to eliminate the inhibiting factors that prevent people from leaving social welfare and going to work. The Fine Gael Party in its manifesto for the last election had ideals which, if it had been in Government for the past three years, would have brought this much further. It is vital that people who are prepared to work gain something from it.
As long as there is a tax wedge that permits them to get as much or, in some cases more, through side benefits from remaining on the dole rather than working it is difficult to encourage them to work. The fact that industry has been given some leeway in regard to PRSI and other incentives is important. We look forward to continued growth — I acknowledge the growth in the past 12 months — increased employment and hopefully better times for all over the next three years under a Fine Gael Coalition led by the Taoiseach, Deputy Bruton.
