GREEN PARTY chairman Senator Dan Boyle has indicated that a pre-budget battle is taking place at Cabinet over social welfare spending and the amount of money being allocated to overseas development aid.
Speaking in the Seanad yesterday, he attacked Danny McCoy, the director general of the employers group Ibec, for suggesting that social welfare spending should be cut as part of a package of measures designed to get the public finances in order.
Mr Boyle condemned Mr McCoy for implying that people were “scrounging” on the welfare system, and said that such comments only made it more difficult for the Government to arrive at hard decisions.
He said there was a very rich irony that someone who represents his organisation as a social partner and who receives a fee of €14,000 for a part-time role on a State body, which is 50 per cent more than the basic rate of social welfare, was making such a call.
“This debate has been bedevilled by the use of terminology. Those who claim to live in an enterprise culture always talk about subsidies and incentives when it comes to progressing their own agendas and issues that benefit them and those with whom they work but when it comes to social welfare and meeting the most basic of needs in our society, we refer to handouts and imply people are scrounging on the system.
“Until we strike the right balance, it will be difficult to make the hard decisions that must be made. The statement by the director of Ibec earlier was far from helpful.
“I do not believe there is capacity to ask for his removal from that organisation because it is separate and independent but given that he earns a fee from a State agency which is many times the amount on which social welfare recipients live, he certainly needs to consider his position on that,” said Mr Boyle.
Turning to the development aid budget, for which €750 million was earmarked in the 2009 budget last October, Mr Boyle said that it had already been cut by €125 million but he added that the Government was endeavouring to keep the percentage in line with the official target for 2012.
“It is difficult because hard decisions must be made but this is informing the Government’s decisions. Whatever the Minister for Finance does next Tuesday will be part of the process,” added Mr Boyle.
There were reports of a strong difference of opinion between Green Party and Fianna Fáil Ministers over the scale of the cuts in development aid announced as part of the package of savings measures in February.
While the final cut amounted to €95 million it is believed that the Department of Finance initially sought a cut of over €200 million in the aid budget and was only persuaded to accept the lower figure because the Greens refused to accept the initial proposal.
There have been reports the department has returned to the issue in recent weeks and is seeking approval for further significant cuts in aid in the light of the deteriorating state of the public finances and the fact that the Irish economy is set to shrink by 7 per cent this year.