Taoiseach Simon Harris has given the clearest indication yet of plans for a giveaway budget, including a fresh boost to infrastructure spending and a new round of payments for households.
Harris said the Government would use the proceeds from the sale of the State’s stake in AIB to speed up vital energy and water projects. He also signalled that in the forthcoming general election he would put forward a major reform of early childhood education provision in which the Stare would take a more central role.
Cost-of-living giveaways in the budget will be paid before Christmas, the Taoiseach also confirmed, saying these “one-off” payments would continue for a third year. In an interview with The Irish Times, Mr Harris confirmed that the budget would be similar to last year, including tax reductions, permanent spending increases (including welfare increases) and a package of cost-of-living payments.
In addition, Mr Harris said the budget could also contain a package of top-up funding for infrastructural projects, utilising the proceeds of the State’s AIB shareholding, which he said amounted to about €2 billion. He said the priority areas for infrastructure investment were water, energy and housing.
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With an election looming and the public finances showing a large deficit, Ministers expect a giveaway budget on October 1st, though the Government will stress that any spending increases will be affordable and it will continue to save much of the large surplus for future needs.
Mr Harris said he believed he had two jobs to do – firstly, to implement the programme for government and lead the Coalition for the rest of its term but then to lead Fine Gael into the election and seek a mandate to lead the government for another five years.
On this, he indicated that he was considering proposing that the State’s education system be extended to include early childhood education.
Elsewhere Mr Harris said large tent encampments erected by asylum seekers would not be permitted “as long as I’m in this office”, and he was critical of “official Ireland” for turning a “semi-blind eye” to the situation on Mount Street and the Grand Canal where hundreds of tents had been pitched until moved on to other locations by the authorities at his insistence earlier this year.
“Yes, tents pop up from time to time,” Mr Harris said. “I’m not dismissive about that, I take that very seriously, but I’ve also been honest about that. I said that when we cleared the encampment at Mount Street. But it’s very different from that happening for a number of days and then people being provided with better, more suitable accommodation, to people living there for months with real, very, very serious public health challenges along with many other challenges as well.”
Mr Harris was strongly critical of the European Union on the situation in Gaza, saying it had “not done nearly enough in relation to that”. He said Ireland would continue to press at EU level for the EU-Israel trade agreement to be reviewed, but added that “the very clear legal advice available to me and to my predecessors through successive attorneys general is that issues around trade are European competencies”.
But when pressed on whether Ireland could take unilateral action against Israel, he said: “I’m not aware of other avenues directly available to us.”
Mr Harris hailed the recent improvement in relations with London, but on Northern Ireland he said he did not intend to make preparations for a border poll or a united Ireland. He said a united Ireland was his and Fine Gael’s aspiration but stressed his priority was to work the Belfast Agreement to improve co-operation between North and South.
“I think the most important thing we have to do right now is not just make preparations for anything, but actually get on with utilising the Good Friday Agreement to bring about its full potential,” he said.
Mr Harris continued to insist the Government would complete its full term, saying this was the request of the leaders of Fianna Fáil and the Green Party when he became Taoiseach in April.
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