I am grateful for the opportunity to speak on budget 2025. I am very proud to commend this budget to the House. As my first budget as Taoiseach, and the last budget of this Government, I believe it a fitting balance between building on progress, helping people in the here and now and pointing the way to a more secure future.
This budget comes at a critical juncture. It comes at a time when people have been strained by a prolonged cost-of-living crisis and while businesses have struggled in the face of rising costs after a series of economic shocks. We have, therefore, put in place a budget that is all about solidarity and security. There is solidarity with people who are struggling with high prices and the cost of raising their family, with those who want to be able to own their homes, and with those families who are waiting for an assessment of need for their child or need help with the cost of school or college. There is more help for carers and older people and a package of measures targeted at alleviating child poverty. We are trying to give working families a break on their tax bills and help with the cost of childcare. There are additional measures to support small businesses and farmers, the job creators and food producers who are the backbone of our economy. It is a record budget for law and order to make sure anti-social behaviour and crime are tackled by increased numbers of gardaí, there are more efficient courts to deliver justice more swiftly and there are more prison places to get criminals off the streets.
My vision is for the strong economic performance we have nurtured to yield benefits in the daily lives of working families, businesses and farmers the length and breadth of this great country, and to lay the foundations of a more secure future. People want to know their children will get the best start in life, that childcare will be available and affordable, that children who need additional care will get it, that they will be supported through school and college, and that when they become ready to own their own homes, they can do so. Most of all, we can no longer tolerate the reality of children living in poverty and this budget takes real and genuine important steps on the path to eliminating it. Deputy McDonald should ask the Children's Rights Alliance when she has finished shaking her head.
In the clamour of budget day, it can be easy to forget that the progress which allows us to set these goals was certainly not guaranteed. It was not guaranteed we would have good choices to make and to make people's lives better. When I first became a TD for Wicklow, the IMF was in town. In my first budget as a TD, the choices facing the Government were limited to bad or worse. Our unemployment rate then was 15%. Today it is 4.3%. We have not got to the position we are in today because of a bit of luck or chance. It is because of the hard work of the Irish people, of Irish businesses and good decisions along the way by successive Governments.
For the Opposition, nothing is ever enough. Every problem is just an opportunity to spread blame and not to try to work together on the solutions our country needs. In this budget, I believe we have struck the right balance. Using the record proceeds at our disposal, we are seeking to respond to the scale of the challenge people are facing with a significant cost-of-living package, an income tax reduction package and a record capital investment programme to invest in housing, healthcare, schools and so many other areas, in the long-term interests of our citizens. People want to feel secure. They want to have economic security to make a good living and pay the bills, and they want to look forward to this same security for their own children. This budget moves us in the right direction because it helps in the here and now. It invests in vital infrastructure now. It also sets aside billions of euro to ensure that future generations are never again caught up in the boom-bust cycle that has blighted this country in the past.
My message to people listening at home is that we know the cost of living is still a real issue for you and your family. Many people feel their personal finances are insecure and might not withstand any further shock. We need to give you a sense of security that the Government gets this. This budget means that your bills and your taxes will go down and your family can keep more of your hard-earned money. In the budget we hare helping with the cost of raising a family by providing two double child benefit payments before Christmas. We are also providing €250 in energy credits and increasing the weekly rate for maternity, paternity, adoptive and parental benefit. We are increasing the working family payment threshold. We are extending hot school meals to all primary school children. We are increasing weekly social welfare rates. We are also increasing weekly child support payments, previously called the IQC, the largest single increase in this payment to tackle child poverty. We are reducing the cost of education through providing schoolbooks for all senior cycle students and cutting college fees by €1,000. We are increasing student grant thresholds by 15% and waiving the State exam fee for another year. We are also making public transport free for children aged eight and under.
We are also ensuring that those who need help get it by increasing the weekly payments to carers and increasing the thresholds to ensure more carers will qualify. We are extending the carer's benefit to self-employed people and enabling carer's allowance to be made a qualifying payment for the fuel allowance. We are increasing the domiciliary care allowance for children with disabilities. We are increasing significantly the number of special needs assistants and special education teachers. We are increasing provision for residential services, home support packages and children's services, including crucial additional funding for assessment of needs.
We are helping older people by increasing weekly pension rates, extending the fuel allowance to people over 66 years of age and providing a universal companion travel pass to all those aged over 70. We are helping students and younger people by, as I have said, reducing the student contribution fee again this year. We are also waiving the State exam fee and extending reduced costs for public transport for another 12 months. We are also increasing the rent tax credit to €1,000.
We are taking further steps towards eradicating child poverty by increasing weekly rates of child support payments by €4 for children aged under 12 and by €8 for children aged over 12, bringing them to €62 per week for those aged over 12 and €50 per week for those aged under 12. This is the largest ever increase applied to this payment. We are extending hot school meals to all primary school children and providing two double child benefit payments. We are also addressing holiday hunger. If we accept a child needs a school meal when the school is open, the child still needs to be fed when the school is shut. We are providing funding for Equal Start, and I acknowledge the leadership of the Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, on this, to target measures to ensure children experiencing disadvantage can access and participate fully in early learning and childcare.
We are putting more money back in your pocket through reduced taxes. The average worker will benefit by more than €900 through the income tax and USC changes announced in this budget. This budget is another step towards reaching my ambition that nobody earning below €50,000 should pay the higher rate of income tax. This follows successive budgets that have substantially improved the take-home pay of an average worker and it is being done it in a fair way. A single parent on €36,000 has seen their take-home pay increase by 15%, while higher-earning couples have seen their take-home pay increase by 5%.
We are cutting inheritance tax, so that someone can pass on an asset to a son or daughter tax-free up to €400,000. We are ensuring active farmers are not penalised for farming their land, with changes to the residential zoned land tax that enable us to bring in a tax on land hoarders.
We are also extending mortgage interest relief, worth up to €250, by another year.
We are backing business by providing a €4,000 energy subsidy scheme; increasing the VAT thresholds for small businesses and the self-employed; changes to the self-employed earned income tax credit to allow them keep more of their hard-earned money; changes to the capital gains tax retirement relief to help families transfer a business to the next generation; making it more attractive for investors to invest in innovative start-ups; enhancing the start-up relief for new small companies, making it easier for small, owner-managed start-ups to survive and grow; and putting in place a €20 million fund to help upskill staff with €8 million targeted at smaller businesses. The Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Deputy Burke, will also announce a review of the cost base of businesses because we have got to help our small and medium businesses with that cost base.
We are backing farmers by increasing funding for tillage, beef, sheep and dairy, with provision of €11 million to beef farmers to bring total funding under the national beef welfare scheme from €50 per calf to €75 per calf. Taken with the CAP-funded suckler carbon efficiency programme, SCEP, total funding per suckler cow is now €225. There is provision of €24 million to the sheep sector, delivering a total fund of €25 per ewe, up from €20 this year; close to a doubling of funds to the dairy calf welfare scheme to provide €20 per calf to the breeder and a new €20 payment to the farmer who rears the calf; provision of funding to reopen the organic scheme in 2025; delivery of a tillage scheme to provide €100 per hectare payment on all sown ground in 2024; provision of initial funding of €5 million for a forgotten farmers’ scheme that will be established next year and further funded in 2026; support for animal health measures and the knowledge transfer programme, a commitment under the CAP; and a new accelerated capital allowance for farm safety will also be introduced to allow farmers investing in certain fixed farm safety items to secure an increased tax write off.
We are backing law and order. This is a record budget for the Minister, Deputy McEntee, with significant increases in funding for the Garda and the Prison Service. We will recruit 1,000 more gardaí and 350 more prison officers as well as increasing prison places by 1,100. We will provide more public order equipment to help gardaí on the beat and keep them safe. We will make our courts work more quickly for victims. We will invest in our migration system to make it more efficient and work faster when it comes to processing times. The Minister has secured significantly increased funding to tackle domestic, sexual and gender-based violence.
Housing is undoubtedly the number one priority. This will be the biggest housing budget ever in the history of the State. The housing budget will be boosted by one-off funding from the sale of AIB shares, which will go to the Land Development Agency and to upgrading water and energy infrastructure, which are vital to the housing pipeline.
We are helping renters with the cost of rent by increasing the rent tax credit to €1,000. That is €2,000 for a couple or €3,000 for three people sharing a rented property. We are helping first-time buyers by extending and expanding the help-to-buy scheme, which has already helped 50,000 individuals or couples, people in every single one of our constituencies.
We are ensuring first-time buyers are prioritised over institutional investors when it comes to the purchase of new homes with further changes to stamp duty on bulk purchases. We are providing €680 million to key affordable housing schemes. We are protecting people who find themselves homeless through a 25% increase in the homelessness services budget.
We know we need to build more homes, and we will. To do this, we need to invest in our water, energy and housing infrastructure, and that is exactly what this budget does. Therefore, we will allocate €1 billion to improve the water system, €1.25 billion to the Land Development Agency and €750 million to Eirgrid to improve our electricity system.
The income tax and USC reduction package means the average worker will be over €916 better off. We have been accused on occasion of focusing too much on income tax reductions. For years, people on the Opposition benches attacked us for giving people tax breaks they did not need. Now, it seems most of Opposition have changed position and they agree too that people need a break when it comes to income tax thresholds and USC. Income tax reductions have been substantial and furthermore, they have been fair. That will be our approach in the years to come. It seems strange to have to debate this point every year, but I believe it should be an agreed principle that income tax bands and credits should be indexed to keep pace with the cost of living. Reducing income tax and USC in this way helps with the cost of living, encourages people to take up work and keeps our tax system competitive internationally.
I also welcome that change to inheritance tax. These thresholds have not been changed since budget 2020 and this is simply a fairness measure to reflect where house prices are at. Parents can now feel more secure that they can pass on a home to their child or children without leaving them with a big tax bill.
To create a more secure future, we need to settle big questions that have created uncertainty for years. This Government and this budget vow to deliver for our young people and their potential and for businesses that tell us of the need for highly skilled workers to drive growth. I am particularly pleased that this budget will now deliver multi-annual certainty on the core funding of higher education by unlocking the national training fund. This is so essential in securing the success of our third-level institutions, and to our employers to ensure the pipeline of talent is kept strong.
The national training fund is a €1.5 billion multi-annual commitment of this Government that will not only boost funding for higher education institutions but will also provide upskilling pathways for many thousands of workers. In providing for multi-annual funding, we also place our further and higher education sector on the secure footing it needs to plan and prosper. The people of this country need to be ready and empowered to face the challenges of the future, and we as Government are now ensuring we are building those skills of the future to respond to those challenges.
I am pleased that this budget will also continue to reduce the cost of third-level education by slashing student contribution fees and increasing student maintenance grants well above the rate of inflation. I am particularly pleased that we will see an increase in the PhD stipend to €25,000 per year. Every individual, no matter who they are, where they come from or what their parents did before them, has to have the ability to reach his or her full potential through education.
I want to live in and lead a country where every child can dream and feel excited about his or her future, where every child has what he or she needs to be happy and healthy and where everyone is able to support the children in their lives to feel loved, included and capable. This budget is another important step towards eliminating child poverty. The ongoing trajectory we have seen in recent years is encouraging, but we have much more to do. For budget 2025, the impact on weekly household disposable income is largest for lone parents. The support for all families in this budget and in the cost-of-living measures is clear from lump sum payments, child support payments, increases to working family payment thresholds and single person child carer tax credit. Through a mix of direct targeted expenditure on children in poverty and increased spending on universal services, we can provide opportunity, nurture potential and prevent stigmatisation. Through successive increases in the child support payment, we have protected low-income families, and this year we are providing the largest single increase in this crucial payment. Following the successful introduction of the hot school meal programme by the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, we will now target holiday hunger, ensuring children most at need have access to a full meal every day regardless of whether it is in the school year.
We are increasing funding to Tusla to support our foster carers, expand our network of family resource centres and provide more residential care placements. I will continue to work closely with the child poverty and well-being programme office in my Department and with colleagues across government to break down silos and devise new ways to combat child poverty.
A key element of overall expenditure in 2025 was early agreement and certainty on the level of health funding. This was an important decision we took as a Government earlier this year. It has resulted in another record year of investment for our health service. Through this agreement, an additional €1.5 billion in funding was provided for the health service this year, along with a further €1.2 billion in ELS for next year. The benefits of these successive increases in funding for health are clear - lower healthcare costs, the introduction of new services, reductions in waiting times, which we are not seeing in many other countries, but we are seeing in Ireland, and fewer patients waiting on trolleys. It has underpinned increases in capacity, with record levels of recruitment meaning thousands more nurses, midwives, health and social care professionals and doctors now working in our health service. It is providing for new hospital, community and critical care beds right across our country.
We live in a country with one of the highest life expectancies in the European Union and we are seeing improving survival rates for so many common diseases. This does not happen by accident. This is as a result of sustained levels of investments in healthcare. To preserve these benefits and provide for an ageing and growing population, next year, we are once again providing record funding to the Department of Health with funding for more than 3,300 healthcare professionals, new drugs and medicines and more training places for our nurses and doctors. We will increase capacity both in our hospitals and close to home by providing more acute and community beds, expanding emergency departments in five hospitals, funding six more injury units and extending GP hours.
When I was Minister for health, I was particularly proud to establish the women’s health task force. I commend the Minister, Deputy Donnelly, for his commitment to delivering on the action plan that flowed from that. In budget 2025, he and the Government have built further on our work in this area with the provision of free HRT and the expansion of the free IVF scheme.
Another area in which we must do more to break down barriers is disability. We can never have this national pass-the-parcel approach when it comes to solving intractable problems. This applies to disability, migration, child poverty and so many other areas.
Regarding disability, we need everyone to pull together. Last week in the House, Deputy Fitzmaurice provided an example that outlined the challenges of the occasionally siloed approach to disability services. I am pleased to see real progress in the area of disability, with a significant increase in the budget this year of 11.6% to expand services. Over the lifetime of this Government, an additional €1.2 billion has been provided for specialist community-based disability services. I am particularly pleased that, next year, we will fund key roles and trainee placements in our children's disability network teams, continue the assessment of need waiting list initiative and support our new autism strategy. There is money to hire significantly more SNAs and special education teachers, enabling children with additional needs to reach their potential in our schools. I welcome the reform work that is happening in the Department of Education to ensure that we move beyond the annual challenge of a parent trying to find an appropriate school place for a child with a disability.
Budgets are not just about today. They are, of course, about tomorrow and, indeed, about planning for our economy and society years from now. We know that, in addition to pent-up housing demand, we have major infrastructural deficits in our country, from water and energy to rail, roads, hospitals and schools. We know we cannot spend the windfall surpluses that our economy produced this year on current expenditure, as doing so would be inflationary. We also know that any windfall has to be invested in a sensible way so as to get the best value from it.
The budget has outlined a series of principles that will govern the allocation of historic surpluses. They all point in the same direction, that being, a prudent approach to meeting the needs of our country. Our society’s progress demands it, and the Government will use the funds from Apple and other surpluses to supply it. From the surpluses generated, we will invest to create a new Ireland that responds to the needs of our citizens with a strategic focus on four pillars: water, electricity, transport and housing. By investing surpluses in these areas, we will future-proof our country, enable people to live the lives they wish to and, once and for all, meet our key infrastructural needs.
I wish to acknowledge that, when we gather here on budget day, many of the Deputies opposite make considered contributions worthy of consideration. We should always be open to other ideas and willing to listen to alternative points of view. However, it is without doubt that there are some Deputies who view budget day merely as an opportunity to outdo one another with performative outrage. Some parties are particularly guilty of this. The reality is that this Government has produced a budget that delivers for the country. Others have produced plans that would wreck the economy with 22 separate tax cuts, an attack on our FDI sector and more taxes on working families and that never mention how they would keep the economy growing and creating jobs, just a discussion about how to spend the surpluses that would not be in place had they been in government. They would not safeguard the future by putting money away in long-term funds like the Government has done and they commit to spending everything that comes in, never saying from where the extra money will come. In contrast, the Government is matching helping people and giving working families a break with protecting our economy and making sure not to increase inflation. We are investing in two long-term funds to ensure we are saving for the future and preparing for a greener future. We are being prudent with windfall receipts, focusing on improving our public infrastructure.
I do not believe that any Irish Government has ever delivered a final budget with such a large surplus and the economy in such good shape. We are using that growing economy, which has more jobs than ever before, to build a more secure future for people and our country. For this reason, I commend our budget.
