Gabhaim buíochas leis an Leas-Cheann Comhairle. I welcome the opportunity to speak on the Bill and to discuss some of the tax changes provided for in budget 2024. It is now three weeks to the day since the budget was announced and, in that time, it has become even more obvious just how short of ambition this Government actually is. Budget 2024 is basically the same approach as in 2023 with an emphasis on short-term measures rather than lasting structural change. Like last year, one of the most disappointing aspects…

At the outset, I want to say that last week when we were debating this issue, the reportage concerned me a bit. There was reportage in The Irish Times that I was first being charitable to the Minister for Health and then that I was not actually being charitable but was being uncharitable to him.

The fact of the matter is that I was not being either; nor was I trying to be either.

It is quite infuriating when debates are reduced to the level of personality clashes or something from the past. It is quite annoying. The point I was making, and I thought I had made it quite strongly, was that the Minister is not the only person responsible for the health budget, that the health budget and its adequacy is the responsibility of the entire Government, from the Taoiseach down. We need to bear that in mind and those people need to bear responsibility for what is happening to the health budget next ye…

I am not sure what the point is of having this session and these statements. There had not been a demand for statements. The Minister and the two Ministers of State have come in here with scripts to try to put the best gloss on things. They have Government, or rather Fianna Fáil, backbenchers coming in and trying to put the best spin on things. I would have thought that the least that could have been done if Government time was being made available for these statements would have been to agree to have questions and…

I asked yesterday.

Okay. The Taoiseach was asked and he completely ignored this request. If we are to have accountability to the Dáil, which Ministers are required to provide, then we need to have questions and answers. As I said, I do not know what the purpose of this session is. The whole issue of the underfunding of health, of course, actually started last year. The allocation made in budget 2023 was not sufficient to maintain the existing level of service and to provide for new services. The whole question of a budget campaign fo…

Excuse me, sorry, I did mention a person. I am talking about a mindset that has been in the Department of Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform, and has continued to be there for some time.

Okay. I will just say that a key element of the responsibility of a Secretary General is to secure adequate funding for what his or her Department requires. I am saying that there is a mindset in the Department of Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform, which has been there and continues to be there, that does not understand the principle of fully-funded public services, especially a key service like that of health. Nor does that Department understand the political decisions that have bee…

From the outset, I have to say that I wonder about the motivation behind this debate. I also want to note that some of the people who were loudest in calling for this debate are not present in the Chamber for it at this point. One only has to do a cursory search of excess deaths on social media to find any number of conspiracy theories and anti-vaccine content. I am not by any means saying we should ignore the statistics for excess mortality because they are important but we should question the framing of this data…

It is not agreed. I welcome the fact that time is to be provided on Thursday for discussing the health funding issue. The Minister for Health will be there but should the Minister for Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform not present himself to the Chamber to tell us about his role in the health budget? A Minister making statements in the Dáil does not constitute accountability to the Dáil. In order for us to agree to the Order of Business, will the Taoiseach agree to time being allowed …

Shame.

Yes. Sitting here listening to the Ministers, Deputies Michael McGrath and Donohoe, I struggle to understand the aim of this budget. After all the leaks and the spin, to what does it amount? It sounds very much like budget 2023 lite - a budget with a bit for everyone, a fair bit more for some who actually do not need it, an emphasis on short-term measures rather than lasting structural measures, and not a whole lot that will substantially change our country for the better in the medium-to-long term. There was an op…

Anybody with their eyes open knows there is a considerable number of vacant homes around the country. It makes no sense whatsoever to leave these homes vacant in the context of a housing crisis. Nor does it makes any sense from a climate perspective. We know that most other countries have long had regulations in place to address this waste. The Government has been very slow to address it, and has unfortunately taken a conservative approach. Will the Minister update us about where we are at with regard to that tax?

A very conservative approach is being taken to this. Revenue has constantly denied the existence of an issue. All of us as public representatives from our experience in canvassing or delivering leaflets see it, especially at election time when calling to a clearly vacant house and there is nobody on the register. It is a significant problem, yet there seems to be no great appetite to address it. Why is that? From a political perspective, there has not been much enthusiasm. Maybe it is because the aim of this is to …

Absolutely, but I do not like the way it is shaping up because it does not come across like there is a serious effort by Revenue or Government to force this issue and bring the houses back into use. That is the purpose of it. The manual concentrates overly on exemptions. How does Revenue verify applications for exemptions? Will the Minister provide information on that? It is not clear that a serious attempt is being made on this. The other issue is the fact it is a self-assessment tax. As it is a new self-assessmen…

That is less than a sixth of what the census is telling us. You are not serious about this unless you do a public campaign on it. You are kind of talking to yourselves.

It does not sound serious.

I want to ask the Tánaiste about the long-promised statutory right to home care. This was promised in 2018. It was supposed to be in place by 2021. Two years later, there is no sign of the legislation. The advisory group recommended improved pay and conditions for the staff, who are very badly paid. Over the summer, the Government cynically agreed to pay those new rates and improve the conditions but at the cost of older people who depend on these services. Very cynically, the Government took almost 2 million hours…

It has cut them this year.