Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions
Dail Éireann — 2026-05-28
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Ged Nash (LAB), Louth

That commitment to engage honestly and transparently should extend to Government Ministers and the Departments being required to come back to the Minister for public expenditure and reform well before 17 July with their very clear plans as to how these levies will impact services in their respective Departments. The reality is that the Dáil is rising on 16 July, and I do not believe that it is a coincidence that the deadline of 17 July was set. We do need accountability in this House. We know that, for example, the medium-term expenditure framework was published the day after the Dáil rose last December. That is a very significant five-year plan from the point of view of the fiscal position of this country and how we sustain our economy going forward. This is very much on brand for this Government: make important decisions when the Dáil is in recess, with no accountability and with Ministers not being available to be held to account by this House for their own budgets for 2027 and their own Estimates in advance of budget 2027. This is a very significant development from the Minister for public expenditure.
There are alternatives to the introduction of levies across Departments. We could look at, for example, reforming our taxation system and ensuring we introduce tax on wealth and assets in a more significant way to pay for the increased public services we all agree we need to introduce, but the Government has decided not to do that.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-05-28/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-21T01:01:08+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-05-28