Tax Reliefs Seanad Éireann — 2026-02-04 ============================================================ Robert Troy (FF), Longford-Westmeath The Senator makes very well-founded points. It is important that we look at next year's budget in the context of how we can support working families who currently are feeling the pressure. Last year's budget took the prudent decision to protect our economy, to protect businesses and to protect jobs. If we do not have jobs, then we have a bigger problem. The Government and the new Minister for Finance - the Tánaiste - have very clearly said it is our intention to ensure that we look at taxation measures that will support working families. It is thought that if the Senator's proposal was introduced, it could lead to further increases in premiums by private health insurance companies that would take advantage of the fact that greater reliefs were to be introduced. We can look at other measures to support working families that ultimately will put more money in their pockets at the end of the day, which is needed. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-02-04/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:35+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-02-04