If that incidence strongly illustrates the case I am making, I should not be under any constraint.

The last point is this. The second substantial objection the Minister of State made, as opposed to the procedural objection, to the recommendation-----

The Leas-Chathaoirleach should also bear in mind that the Minister of State chose to comment on the recommendation and that that invites a response from me. We are not on Second Stage or Report Stage and I am not trying to hold up the House. However, a stupid convention has come into this House where, if we decide to rush legislation, we will make it difficult for legislators to make their point.

It is a disgrace.

It is a disgrace.

I am not someone who jumps up and down or engages in theatrics or tries to get myself thrown out of the Chamber as other people in these Houses have done over the years. I have endured nothing but obstruction from the Chair, even when I have tried to-----

-----make points without repeating myself.

No.

I was coming to a second substantial point.

It can hardly be the case on Committee Stage of this legislation that the Minister of State can attack the rationale behind or the implications of my proposed recommendation and that I would not be given an opportunity to address it. I would have addressed this point in much shorter order, if I did not have to constantly apologise for still being on my feet. The second substantial objection the Minister of State made to my recommendation concerned public servants. Of course, public servants can produce works of cul…

-----and people might have had views as to its artistic or cultural merit. However, the fact is that the artist's exemption was designed to protect those who were at risk of poverty. In reverse order, the two legs of the proposed recommendation were as follows: a person who, in any of the three years preceding the assessment, was in receipt of income in excess of €100,000. Such a person is not at risk of poverty. That is the merit of that part of it, and it applies to anybody, regardless of whether he or she is a p…

No, it was not. It was not.

No. The difference between the defined benefit and the defined contribution scheme-----

I did not give an extensive rationale for the reason the first part of the proposed recommendation deals with public officeholders. There is a very obvious difference between being Member of the Dáil or the Seanad, a judge or the Attorney General, or someone like that, and being in the private sector. Generally speaking, we are cushioned in a way that people in the private sector and county councillors are not.

-----and that is the reason. I do not know if the Minister of State is suggesting, for example, that there is some kind of constitutional obstacle to placing this kind of particular burden on public officeholders. There certainly was not a constitutional obstacle to the pension-related deduction that was introduced after the financial crash. Therefore, there is a clear rationale and I ask the Minister of State to reflect on it, and not just him personally. With the greatest of respect to the Minister of State, as h…

Given that we are borrowing and spending shedloads of money, now is the time to change the improper application of a tax exemption which has been availed of by high earners or people on secure pensions.

Now is the time to engage intellectually and politically with that proposal. I would ask the Minister of State to consider the recommendation and that the Government might resubmit it on Report Stage.

I do not agree to it.

I do not intend to support it because section 5 should be my section 5. I intend to oppose it.

Votáil.