Vol. 843 No. 1
1. Deputy Sean Fleming asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the legislative provisions in respect of his Department that have been passed by the Oireachtas but have not come into effect to date; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [23710/14]
Arising from the recent revelation, which made clear that while the Oireachtas had passed legislation, the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform had failed to bring it into operation, as a result of which the former Minister for Justice, Equality and Defence, Deputy Shatter, was able to claim his severance payment when he stood down, will the Minister tell me what other legislative provisions in respect of his Department have been passed by the Oireachtas but have not yet come into effect?
The following are the legislative provisions under my remit that have been passed by the Oireachtas and have yet to come into effect. The first is the Construction Contracts Act 2013, the aim of which is to have a new system which will both reduce the non-payment exposure of subcontractors and provide an effective remedy for them should non-payment occur. The Bill passed all Stages in the Houses of the Oireachtas in July 2013 and was signed into law on 29 July 2013. Two further steps are necessary for the operation of the legislation prior to its commencement. The first, a comprehensive code of practice for the conduct of adjudication, has been the subject of consultation with the key stakeholders. The final draft of the code of practice was circulated to stakeholders in March. The second element requires the establishment of a panel of adjudicators and that will be done as soon as the discussions are concluded with key stakeholders.
The other legislative measure is the Oireachtas (Ministerial and Parliamentary Offices) (Amendment) Act 2014, the main purpose of which, as the Deputy knows because we went through it in some detail here, is to make certain changes to what had become known as the party leader's allowance. The allowance has been payable to leaders of qualifying parties since 1938, to Independent Deputies since 1996, and to Independent Senators since 2001. Sections 1 and 5 of the Act have come into effect. The remaining sections come into effect on 1 July next, as per the Oireachtas (Ministerial and Parliamentary Offices) (Amendment) Act 2014 (Commencement) Order 2014, SI 210 of 2014, and the Ministerial and Parliamentary Offices Act 1938 (Sections 10A, 10B, 10C and 10D) (Fixed Day) Order 2014, SI 211 of 2014. Section 6 provides that commencement of the Act would be subject to a ministerial order, or orders, as necessary. As the Act, for the first time, imposes a significant obligation on Independent Members of the Oireachtas to provide substantial information to the Standards in Public Office Commission, I decided to afford the appropriate lead-in time to 1 July for that to happen, and that is why the commencement date for that provision is 1 July.
I know the Minister was very keen to pass the Oireachtas (Ministerial and Parliamentary Offices) (Amendment) Act 2014. He might explain why he chose not to commence it until such time as he was embarrassed publicly to so do when the Minister, Deputy Shatter, announced his resignation and why he has now chosen to bring the remainder of it into operation in a month's time or so and not on the same date as applied to the ministerial severance payments.
The Construction Contracts Act 2013 has been around for years on end. Senator Feargal Quinn laboured extensively to get it through the Houses of the Oireachtas and many people have been in touch with me in recent times complaining that it has not yet taken effect. As the Minister knows, this is having a detrimental impact on the construction industry because it affects the rules in regard to how contractors and subcontractors will be paid for work. As long as the Minister keeps that legislation in suspension, uncertainty prevails in the industry.
The Deputy asked me two questions. Regarding his first one as to why I did not commence the Oireachtas (Ministerial and Parliamentary Offices) (Amendment) Act immediately, I engaged in consultation with the affected people. Deputy Catherine Murphy, who is present in the Chamber, will confirm that there is a requirement to have a lead-in time for people to make necessary arrangements. I notified everybody in writing of that fact on 17 April, five days after the President signed the Bill. I wrote to the Deputy's leader on 17 April confirming that legislation would come into effect on 1 July and I never heard a word about it objecting to, or demurring, that.
In regard to the Construction Contracts Act, which is important legislation, credit is due, as the Deputy rightly said, to Senator Feargal Quinn for the Trojan work he did. I decided to take that work on. It required very substantial amendment and Senator Quinn worked with us in doing that. We have enacted it but there are real issues to be agreed by all the stakeholders and it is the stakeholders who have been engaged in that process. I want to commence this Act as soon as is practicable.
I had a quick look through the various items of legislation that have been passed by the Minister's Department since he came into office. He might tell us - if he does not have the answer to hand today, he might send it on to me - when he commenced the operation of the legislation providing for a national lottery regulator. If he does not have the answer to that on file with him he might forward it to me. The lottery has now been privatised and the legislation in that respect provides for the regulator.
The Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest Act 2013 was to threaten public servants to pass the Haddington Road agreement.
Now that the agreement is in place, has the Minister implemented all the measures within that Act, or are they in abeyance, ready to be implemented at a later date if, as the Minister or perhaps some of his colleagues might predict, public servants do not adhere to the agreement?
Will the Minister comment on the status of the Houses of the Oireachtas (Inquiries, Privileges and Procedures) Act 2013 in the context of the failure thus far to initiate a banking inquiry?
I have indicated the two Acts that have not commenced and the reasons for that delay. In regard to the National Lottery Act 2013, my recollection is that it was brought fully into effect on the day the national lottery contract was signed.
The establishment of a banking inquiry is nothing to do with me. Under the terms of the relevant Act, it is a matter solely for the Houses of the Oireachtas, and it would be quite improper of me to impose my view on the Oireachtas in this matter.
2. Deputy Mary Lou McDonald asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the role of PPP financing in the phase 4 infrastructure stimulus projects he announced on 13 May 2014; if such PPP contracts will be subject to value for money auditing; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [23674/14]
My question has two parts. The first refers to the financing arrangements for the phase 4 infrastructure stimulus projects the Minister announced on 13 May. The second part relates to public private partnership, PPP, contracts and the use or otherwise of value for money auditing in making decisions to go that route as against the traditional route.
On Tuesday, 13 May, I announced phase 4 of the infrastructure stimulus projects. This phase involves €200 million of Exchequer investment to fund projects in a range of sectors, including road schemes, social housing to meet acute needs arising in that area, and a range of tourism-related works that will help to support long-term jobs in that sector. This investment will also help to fund a range of projects commemorating the foundation of our State. As with previous investment packages, the projects are spread around the country and will create economic activity and employment on a regional basis. The investment will be funded through the Exchequer from the proceeds of the sale of State assets.
The phase 4 stimulus announcement does not involve any PPP projects. The initial stimulus announcement I made in July 2012 included €1.5 billion of PPP investment, and work on the delivery of those projects is under way by the relevant Departments and agencies. Value for money testing is part of the standard project appraisal process for PPPs that is carried out by the National Development Finance Agency, NDFA, and the relevant sanctioning authority in each case.
Of the €200 million investment to which the Minister referred, all of which will be directly funded by the Exchequer, how much will come from the sale of State assets?
The Minister indicated that the value for money audit is a standard part of the project appraisal process. According to the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government, €6.2 billion was invested in the water services sector between 2000 and 2010. This involved 66 very large projects, many of them in the wastewater sector. The astonishing thing is that when one questions that Department about value for money auditing of these projects, it claims to have no role in the matter and bounces the ball back to the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform. However, a parliamentary question I put to the Minister, Deputy Howlin, for answer today in respect of the wastewater sector and the value for money auditing which apparently has not been carried out in respect of these projects, my question was disallowed. I am asking why, where the PPP route was chosen for wastewater projects that formed part of that investment €6.2 billion, value for money audits either have not been carried out, or if they have, it is almost impossible to obtain the detail from the system as to what those audits reflected?
All of the €200 million stimulus I recently announced is coming from the dividend paid to the State by ESB and Bord Gáis Éireann from the sale of assets.
On the Deputy's second question, I have no notice in regard to water investment. I would have sought a briefing on the issue if I had known the Deputy was going to inquire about it.
However, what I will say, in general terms, is that a PPP project is automatically evaluated by law by the National Development Finance Agency which independently certifies whether it is value for money.
I thank the Minister for his answer. It seems almost impossible to get at the information required. I think the Minister will agree that €6.2 billion of investment in the wastewater sector is very significant. I think he will also agree that given the fact the public is now bracing itself for the imposition of water charges, concerns are now heightened as to that scale of investment, where that liability will lie and, most crucially, an assurance that the choice of public private partnership for investment of that scale was the correct choice. A number of years ago a committee of this House recommended that the Comptroller and Auditor General should be able to report on these schemes in the wastewater treatment facilities but, unfortunately, the Comptroller and Auditor General is precluded from carrying out that investigation by law. We then had a situation where the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government and the Minister's Department were before the Committee of Public Accounts some months ago and, when questioned about value for money audits on this issue, they could not answer the questions and they passed the ball from one Department to the other.
While the Minister might not have the specifics on the wastewater treatment facilities with him today, I would like him to respond to me, perhaps in writing, on that issue. More specifically, will the Minister tell me with whom the buck stops in terms of carrying out these value for money audits? In which Department is it vested?
I have already answered that question inasmuch as it is each line Department which is responsible for the oversight and maintenance of projects within its own area. The Deputy told us her question was out of order but then asked a series of supplementary questions on the question on which I am not briefed, so it is not reasonable that I would be asked to answer them. However, in general terms, the questions the Deputy asked would be appropriate for the Joint Committee on the Environment, Community and Local Government to get detailed information from the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government and Irish Water and, if they are projects which have been processed through the NDFA, from the NDFA directly.
3. Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform if he will lift the public sector recruitment embargo; his views on whether staff shortages in areas such as the health service, local government and associated services are now resulting in the unacceptable decline in the quality of those services; if he has carried out a cost-benefit analysis of the cost and efficiency of outsourcing across all Government Departments and State bodies; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [23815/14]
The public sector recruitment embargo started by the last Government and continued by the Minister's has led to an enormous reduction in staff numbers in key areas of public service, in particular in the health service and in local authorities. The Minister's slogan originally was, "We'll get more for less". I put it to him that when one looks at the chronic staff shortages in the health service, leading to serious risks to patient safety in our hospitals and to tens of thousands of children on waiting lists for speech and language assessments, and when one looks at the disastrous housing crisis with which local authorities are unable to deal, we have to now consider lifting the public sector recruitment embargo and getting staff into key areas like housing departments, housing maintenance sections and hospitals.
As I have previously stated, there is no embargo on recruitment to the public service. To safeguard front line and priority services, the Government has allowed for critical posts to be filled throughout the period of consolidation of our public finances, as the Deputy well knows. In addition to this ongoing recruitment, special provision was made in last October's budget for the recruitment of, for example, more than 900 extra resource teachers for the school system and 150 new social care workers for Tusla, the new Child and Family Agency. The Government recognises areas of most need and it is responding to them where it can.
There are restrictions and limits on recruitment and promotion in the public service and these need to be understood on two fronts. First, the Government has a responsibility to control the cost of public services, given the incredibly difficult fiscal targets under which it is labouring. Second, the Government is committed to public service reform and is focused on driving efficiency and improving how public services are delivered.
Ongoing and meaningful reform is critical. Together with the Haddington Road agreement, the second public service reform plan which I launched in January provides the template for a better platform for public service delivery. The Government blueprint for reform demands that public service managers critically examine current business practices and processes with the goal of improving services and the service experience for citizens and get better value for taxpayers. Shared services, external service delivery, better use of technology and procurement reform are the building blocks that form part of every administration across the world for better, citizen-focused services.
In looking at these options, public service managers are required to engage with and consult employees and their representatives. Where public service bodies are considering external service delivery, for example, they must evaluate each function under consideration on a case-by-case basis. If a business case has not been made and there are not clear and compelling reasons for external service delivery, then it will not happen. The Deputy is fully aware that we need to reduce the cost of public service delivery but maintain as best we can an efficient, appropriate service for the 21st century.
That is the cruel, cold logic of cutbacks but the reality is that in December of last year 32,000 children were waiting for speech and language assessments, many of them for more than a year, and 16,000 children were waiting for therapy. The INMO says that in hospitals we need one staff member for four patients, whereas currently we have one per eight during the day and one per 12 during the night. We have three times less staff than we need to keep patients safe.
Could the Deputy ask a question, please?
In local authorities, people with chronic disabilities, heart conditions and other vulnerable people are being told they have to wait a year or two to get a grab rail in order that they can get up the stairs to have a bath. That is absolutely unacceptable, yet the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform sanctioned three new spin doctors at the beginning of this year. It was considered vital to have PR advisers but-----
Could the Deputy ask a question, please?
-----the nurses and local authority staff needed to help vulnerable people and children cannot be employed.
We have 287,000 public servants and it is a bit disingenuous to mention three in the scale of what we need to do. As the Deputy is aware - I accept it is not politically acceptable to him - the whole focus of what we have to do is balance our budget in order that we can afford to maintain public services into the future. The Deputy is against a reduction in numbers in any sector, even in the case of rebalancing, where we are putting people on the front line and taking away back office and support staff through the use of shared services, better procurement, the reduction of quangos and all the other measures we are taking. Deputy Boyd Barrett is against a reduction in numbers or a reduction in pay but he wants us to spend more. However, he is against all charges and taxes as well. It is a wonderful fairyland he lives in.
I am fully in favour of cutting the pay of people at the top of the public service and politicians, and reducing the number of bureaucrats at the top of the system, but I am absolutely against having levels of staff shortages among nurses that endanger patient safety, that we do not have enough people to carry out assessments on vulnerable children with special needs or that we do not have maintenance people in local authorities who can put in grab rails or carry out renovations on houses of elderly, sick and vulnerable people. That is not acceptable. Cutting the numbers to the level that has taken place means public services are grinding to a halt and vulnerable people depending on those services are being made suffer cruelly.
The Deputy should ask a question, please.
What is the Minister going to do about that?
It is not only ridiculous but wrong to say public services have ground to a halt. A total of 287,000 public servants are working very hard to provide a very fine public service to people. Of course there are pressures, because we are in a situation where we have downsized and where we have to reduce expenditure as we do not have the capacity to spend. We cannot spend money we do not have. The whole focus of the reform agenda is to reprioritise to the front line, to the very services Deputy Boyd Barrett talked about, by making the rational decisions about shared services, reducing administration, doing things much more efficiently and providing for front-line services such as the additional social care workers and resource teachers to which I referred. The aim is to put those into the front line of delivery in order that people can have a good experience.
The Deputy's view is that in an ideal world the answer to everything is to provide whatever is demanded by anybody and to be popular. In the real world, where there are finite resources, we are making rational decisions to ensure we optimise the value for the money we have in terms of the quality of the services we deliver for the people who depend upon them.
4. Deputy Sean Fleming asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the steps he is taking to ensure all expenditure measures announced in budget 2014 are implemented throughout Departments; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [23711/14]
Last October, during his budget day speech, the Minister announced savings of €113 million through medical card probity analysis which led to the onslaught we have had against the elderly and sick people who have lost their medical cards despite every member of the Government, including the Taoiseach, stating there was no change in Government policy. On the same day, the Minister announced measures to discontinue the telephone allowance for elderly people. He also announced measures to discontinue mortgage interest supplement and to cut illness benefit. Is he still determined to ensure all of these public service cuts will continue to happen during this year?
The Government decided on departmental allocations for 2014 in the budget which I announced on 15 October 2013. The full details of these allocations were set out in the Revised Estimates for public services published on 18 December 2013 and approved by the Dáil on Thursday, 30 January 2014. Ministers and their Departments are responsible for ensuring that their Vote-level allocations are adhered to while at the same time managing the delivery of services. All Departments are required to report to my Department on a monthly basis on their actual current and capital expenditure compared with their published expenditure profiles and to explain where variations arise. My Department is in regular contact with Departments and offices to ensure that expenditure is being controlled, and where necessary my Department meets regularly with line Departments to review financial management in order to minimise any risk of expenditure overruns. The Deputy is very critical if there are overruns every time I answer questions here.
The Comprehensive Expenditure Report 2012-2014 introduced a new model of multi-annual budgeting for current expenditure, as the Deputy is aware, called a medium-term expenditure framework, MTEF. The MTEF was initiated on an administrative basis and following enactment of the Ministers and Secretaries Amendment Act 2013, the arrangements for fixed spending ceilings for each ministerial Vote group for a rolling three year period have a statutory basis. The details of the operation of the ministerial expenditure ceilings are set out in an administrative circular issued by my Department last Autumn.
As the Deputy is aware, we have been going through very challenging economic and fiscal conditions which have necessitated significant adjustments to voted expenditure. The efforts made by Ministers and Departments to ensure adherence to allocations, along with the regular monitoring by my Department and regular reporting to Government, have ensured that the required fiscal targets have been consistently met each year since the Government was elected.
I will go back to the statement made by the Minister last October to be implemented this year, in particular the savage cuts he and his party colleague, the Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Joan Burton, inflicted on people this year. Why is the Labour Party in government when the Minister and Deputy Burton-----
The Minister, Deputy Burton.
The Minister, and the Minister, Deputy Joan Burton, have announced the discontinuance of the telephone allowance for elderly people. They also approved cuts to maternity and adoptive benefits, as announced by the Minister, Deputy Howlin, and implemented by the Minister, Deputy Burton, who obviously agreed to it before the announcement. The Ministers also cut illness benefit and jobseeker's allowance for young people, and the Minister, Deputy Burton, single-handedly ensured the discontinuance of mortgage interest supplement for new applicants in mortgage difficulty. In addition to this, and it appears without the agreement of the Minister for Health, the Minister announced a reduction of €113 million in the medical card budget which has led to a series of U-turns. I cannot begin to list how many U-turns have been done on this issue in recent weeks.
The Deputy had better make up his mind. One day he accuses us of following the Fianna Fáil programme to the letter and states we should not get any credit for it because it is all Fianna Fáil's doing while the next he is saying it is a programme Fianna Fáil wants to completely disown and it has nothing to do with it. In truth, it is neither. We renegotiated the programme with the troika. We are on a trajectory to get our deficit below 3%. We will still borrow €8 billion this year to pay for our services and this is a huge burden because we are piling up further debt. We want to minimise this by having a balanced budget as quickly as we can, consistent with making rational decisions.
It is as though one could make the level of budgetary adjustments the people have been obliged to endure and have endured without affecting any social welfare, health or education services. As the Deputy knows full well, the four Departments of Health, Social Protection, Education and Skills and Justice and Equality between them account for 87% of all current expenditure and it would be impossible to make those adjustments.
Thank you. I will come back to the Minister.
The Deputy cannot will the ends and deny the Government the means.
While I certainly will the ends, which are to balance the books, I deny the means by which the Government has gone about it in each of its three budgets. The ESRI and everybody have stated they were the most unfair budgets Ireland has had in recent years-----
It said no such thing.
-----in that the cuts have been directed at those on the lowest levels of income and additional sources of revenue have not been targeted at those earning more than €100,000. It begs the question as to the reason the Minister has been in government supporting Fine Gael policy all along. I refer to something I cannot understand. The Minister announced cuts of €113 million in respect of medical cards in his budget here, which has led to the fiasco all Members have experienced and about which the Minister has learned at first hand. However, Members had spoken in this Chamber on this issue every single week for the past six months, but when the Government went knocking on the doors, the people told it the same thing. The Taoiseach announced the setting up of a committee and was going to deal with it. There is a new committee, he carried out a U-turn, he was going to give back the cards but then was not going to give them back and does not know whether he can do so or whether people must reapply. It is an absolute shambles and it all goes back to the Minister's announcement that €113 million was to be cut out of the medical card budget.
While the Deputy would like to rewrite history, had the Government implemented the programme that Fianna Fáil agreed with the troika, as part of the previous Administration, the Deputy personally would be spending €1.5 billion less on social welfare this year. One can work out what that would mean for pensioners, for those dependent on social welfare provision and for the unemployed. I note that in the budgetary projects Fianna Fáil set out, it sought to crucify the unemployed. Consequently, I will take no lessons with regard to what the Government has done. The Government has done what it needed to do to balance the budget but did so in the most fair and humane way possible. It has protected basic social welfare payments. I would have liked to have admitted no cuts at all and certainly from my perspective, as I have stated in every budget speech, I take no pleasure in reducing public expenditure in areas on which I would like to spend more. However, I cannot spend money I do not have. While Members can continue to fight the election, it is over and they should now talk reality because the people want a future. They wish to know that the hard and difficult decisions they have endured will bring them a brighter future and not to have the illusion that all can be washed or wiped away in a return to phoney economics, as implemented in the dying days of the previous Administration.
5. Deputy Mary Lou McDonald asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform if he is considering or has had discussions to date on the proposal to restore all rights, entitlements and conditions that pertained prior to the Haddington Road agreement upon its expiry in July 2016. [23709/14]
I do not believe that any of the hard-pressed families or workers or those out of work across the State are living with anything other than the absolute realities of the decisions taken by the Government and its predecessor. One such group of workers are low paid public and civil servants who have endured cuts to their take home pay of anything between 18% and 20% since 2009. A commitment has been made to the lowest paid within the public service and Civil Service that their pay levels will be restored and my question asks the Minister whether he has had discussions with his colleagues in government to that effect.
To achieve the general Government deficit target of below 3% of GDP by 2015, all components of the public finances must make a contribution. I have acknowledged repeatedly that public servants have made a significant contribution to the fiscal recovery of the State through a number of measures which have helped to reduce the public service gross pay bill from its peak of €17.5 billion in 2009 to an estimated €13.63 billion, net of the pension related deduction, in 2014. In this context, reducing the Exchequer pay bill has been an important element in reducing public expenditure. While unprecedented efforts have been made to reduce the cost of the public service pay bill since 2009 through the operation of the financial emergency legislation and other measures, pay costs still amount to 29% of all current expenditure.
The Haddington Road agreement, which came into force on 1 July 2013, included a number of measures, including pay reductions for those public servants on annual salaries in excess of €65,000 under the financial emergency measures in the public interest, FEMPI, legislation. These measures provided for a reduction of the public service pay and pensions bill by an additional €1 billion by 2016.
It is a three-year agreement covering the period to the end of June 2016 and forms the basis for current public service pay policy over that period. Through its provisions, the agreement is also delivering an unprecedented structural increase of almost 15 million additional working hours annually to be deployed for the benefit of the people of the State. The productivity is contributing to the maintenance of our public services at a time of significant restraint.
Under section 12 of the Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest Act 2013, I must review the Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest Acts 2009-2013 annually and cause a written report of my findings to be laid before each House of the Oireachtas. As part of that review I am required to consider whether the measures continue to be necessary, having regard to the purposes of the legislation. My next such report will be laid before the Houses of the Oireachtas on 30 June 2014.
Paragraph 1.15 of the public service agreement 2012-2014, the prior agreement, reaffirmed that priority would be given to public servants with pay rates at €35,000 or less when reviewing the reinstatement of pay levels. The Minister referred to the fiscal ruination of the State; many low-paid public and civil servants are facing fiscal ruination in their own homes.
A woman from Dublin who is a clerical officer wrote to me recently. Her weekly wage, before tax and deductions, is €445.71. She is being crippled. A number of the additional work requirements such as additional hours to be worked under the Haddington Road agreement have placed an additional burden of child care costs on this woman. She finds herself in an unsustainable position. Along with many other low-paid workers in the public service and the Civil Service, she finds herself figuring that she would be better off to stay at home and not to work. I ask the Minister to answer the question whether he plans to reinstate the wage levels of these low-paid workers in the public service and Civil Service. Has the Government discussed this matter? Does the Minister intend to honour the commitment made to these workers?
The Deputy has quoted from the Haddington Road agreement. It is my intention as I faithfully negotiated it with all trade unions. It was the first time that every public service trade union voted for an agreement because people were seized of the necessity to save the country at that stage.
The structure of the Haddington Road agreement is to require pay reductions from those who best are able to afford it. The only cash reductions were for those earning in excess of €65,000. That was the measure we negotiated as a Government in order to protect those on low pay. However, we asked for additional working from them, for example, if working less than 37 hours a week to work for 37 hours and if working more than 37 hours to work up to 39 hours per week. This has been largely done. This allows us to deploy that 15 million additional hours to reduce agency pay and overtime rates and to make the savings. In some instances, those savings have been rolled into what I have called the Haddington Road dividend, to allow for additional front-line people to be employed at a time of very scarce resources. I can assure the Deputy that the provisions of Haddington Road will be fully adhered to by the Government.
I presume, then, that in accordance with paragraph 2.3 of the Haddington Road agreement, that those moneys will be reinstated to those workers. The Minister should bear in mind that whatever about workers having been seized of the necessity to balance the books, to save the day and to save the State, as he asserts, if I recall correctly they were certainly seized by the prospect of the Minister waving a big stick and telling those very workers that if they were not agreeable to cuts to their wages that he would legislate for them anyhow. Does the Minister remember saying that? Does he remember that debacle because the workers have not forgotten it?
The reality of life for large numbers of low-paid workers in the public service and Civil Service is that they are struggling and struggling badly and along with everyone else they now face the prospect of additional taxes, not least a water tax to which the Minister is committed.
Can the Minister say - not in coded language but in very straightforward language - that he will honour the commitment made to those on pay rates of €35,000 and less, that they will have their proper salary reinstated and will he tell us when that might happen?
I have a good memory and I recall. Unlike some members of the Deputy's party opposite, I have a very good memory of everything in which I was involved in the past. I remember the day of the Haddington Road agreement. I remember the Deputy opposite standing on the plinth decrying the agreement, sight unseen.
It had not yet been published and the Deputy was against it because that is the default position of her party. It did not matter what was in the agreement. The Deputy was against it before the text became available or any worker had been asked to cast a vote on it.
The Haddington Road agreement remains an important part of the painful and difficult adjustment that will give a future to all workers and ensure we have affordable public services. We could have embarked on a different path. The Deputy's party wanted to send the troika packing and keep their money. We would not have any public services or an economy if that course of action had been followed. People will remember that.
